To state that Americans and Europeans have different attitudes toward the concept of state is commonplace, but how does this influence the study of public administration? This article traces differences in Western administrative thought in terms of traditions underlying the conceptualization of public administration. The traditions encompass a specific orientation toward the state (ontology) and toward conceptualization (epistemology); combining the two, the more common stateness/stateless differentiation can be refined as a means to capture different sentiments in administrative theory. The article concludes with an assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the two ideal-typical traditions and calls for the further development of the concept of the administrative state.
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