Rutgers SOP

Statement of Purpose for a Rutgers University PhD in Public Administration Rajeet Guha As a young adult growing up in India in the post nineties liberalization era, I was witness to a rapidly growing dichotomy. I saw the emergence and development of a first world India as it were with state of the art privately provided social and economic services for those who could pay, along with a stagnant third world continuum of shoddy, often failing, publicly provided services for the poor other half of the country. I remember going to a Central Government Health Service dispensary with my father in the early nineties and being told day after day that the medicine supplies had still not arrived. Years later in 2001, as a young man, I remember going to the privately run Apollo Clinic in Delhi and being greatly impressed with the efficiency of services, albeit at a high cost. More than a decade later things don't seem to have changed much. Intuitively, I have always felt that the blame for this stark inequality must be laid at the door of public policy making and public administration. To my mind a raison d'être of public policy and administration is to enhance human well being and promote a more equal and harmonious society by helping to give all people equitable access to public goods, services and entitlements even as the market does what it does best: allocate resources for the creation of goods and services. With rapidly rising economic and social inequalities everywhere, whether in emerging economies or even in the US, public administration seems to be failing by this standard. Is my hypothesis about the true mission of Public Administration accurate? Why is it then failing? Can such a mission or standard be compatible with notions of market efficiency? Finding answers to these questions constitute my biggest motivation for pursuing a PhD program in Public Administration. A PhD program will give me the depth of knowledge, research skills and scholarship needed to probe these questions. I also believe that with deepened knowledge in this area I will be able to contribute to the welfare of those for whom the stakes in the quality and efficacy of governance systems are particularly high. The PhD program at Rutgers constitutes an excellent choice given my interests and aspirations. Its emphasis on performance as the key to effectiveness in public administration appeals to me very much. Focus on performance is at the heart of my emphasis on the benchmark standards of public administration to address social and economic inequalities. This performance orientation is also evident in the clarity with which the learning goals, success indicators and action points have been postulated. Finally the three goals of the program: research and teaching skills, original research, and career preparation seem to be very comprehensive and relevant to my dreams and aspirations. I visualize a career that can combine research and scholarship in public administration with actual public administration experience. This would mean teaching and researching public administration in a university full time combined with periodic advisory assignments or field work with governments and public agencies: facilitating a continuous two way interaction. A PhD program is the first step towards fulfilling that aspiration. In my PhD research, I would like to look at public policy making and service delivery, particularly in the area of healthcare. I want to research and understand better what prevents the bridging of inequalities of access, quality of care and outcomes for people. I will look forward to guidance from the university in order to narrow the focus further. If selected, I will bring to the program my background in public administration and economics, work experience in the area of development administration spanning both the non-government sector and the UN (internship at UNDP and volunteer work in UNICEF and UN HABITAT) and a developing country perspective. I have been mostly in charge of program administration, communication and advocacy, and research. I am now working for a non-profit specializing in the promotion of STEM education world wide as the Program Coordinator. I have always liked the independence, integrity, mission and purpose of the organizations in the not for profit sector. I am confident that Rutgers will provide the right environment, teaching and guidance to understand how public policy making and the administration of public programs and institutions can make a dent on what is perhaps the most defining challenge of our times: inequalities. It will also help me find a career, which straddles both research and practice. I would be privileged to be considered for the PhD program.