Government can make life more tolerable. Be it defending national borders, putting out fires, educating children, enforcing antidiscrimination laws, or tending to the aged, ill, or handicapped, public administrators, civil servants, and government bureaucracies perform many thankless services that social and economic institutions alone neither can nor want to undertake. Yet it is these tasks that enrich people’s lives, making it possible not simply to live, but to live well. Despite the important role that government plays in our lives, many of its organizations and functions remain a mystery to the average citizen. The Encyclopedia of Public Administration and Public Policy is written to help dispel this mystery and clarify what government agencies and their public.
