Abstract
Replication is an important mechanism through which broad lessons for theory and practice can be drawn in the applied interdisciplinary social science field of public administration. We suggest a common replication framework for public administration that is illustrated by experimental work in the field. Drawing on knowledge from other disciplines, together with our experience in replicating several experiments on topics such as decision making, organizational rules, and government–citizen relationships, we provide an overview of the replication process. We then distill this knowledge into seven decision points that offer a clear set of best practices on how to design and implement replications in public administration. We conclude by arguing that replication should be part of the normal scientific process in public administration to help to build valid middle-range theories and provide valuable lessons to practice.
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
10-2019
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.1093/jopart/muy047
Funding Information
This work was supported by: University Grants Committee, Research Grants Council (project no. CityU 11611516); Public Policy Research Funding Scheme from the Central Policy Unit of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (project no. 2015.A1.031.16A); City University of Hong Kong Department of Public Policy Conference grant and College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences Capacity Building grant; National Research Foundation of Korea grant funded by the Korean Government (NRF-2017S1A3A2067636).
Related Content
A correction to this article is available for download as an additional file listed at the end of this record.
Repository Citation
Walker, Richard M.; Brewer, Gene A.; Lee, M. Jin; Petrovsky, Nicolai; and van Witteloostuijn, Arjen, "Best Practice Recommendations for Replicating Experiments in Public Administration" (2019). Public Policy and Administration Faculty Publications. 5.
https://uknowledge.uky.edu/msppa_facpub/5
Supplementary data
muy062.pdf (70 kB)
Correction to this article
Included in
Public Affairs, Public Policy and Public Administration Commons, Quantitative, Qualitative, Comparative, and Historical Methodologies Commons
Notes/Citation Information
Published in Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, v. 29, issue 4.
© The Author(s) 2018
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.