Presenting the Guidelines for Quality Improvement of Scientific Productions in Public Administration field in Iran Based on Content Analysis of PAP Journal

The science of public administration claims to provide a way for the state and the government, and the surprises of its scholars bring about double harm to society. Accordingly, the need for proper governance of the science of public administration is twofold; one of the indicators of a specialized discipline is the specialized publications in that field, which show the accumulation of authors and research papers around a new research area.

Design/Methodology/Approach: 

Given the importance of this topic, the reasearch focused on one of the core production sources of public administration field in Iran (Public Administration Perspective Quarterly, PAP). Through theoretical sensitivity judgments, the inclusive bibliometric data of journal have been explored in a reciprocal approach using two mixed methods (quantitative and qualitative content analysis) and applying scientometric techniques. The research population is the eight-year publication history (from the beginning of the publication until the end of the year 2018) of PAP.

Of the 247 articles published, most of the authors were male and from Shahid Beheshti University. Respecting research design, most of the data gathering instrument was questionnaire and the main approach of the research were quantitative and the type of most researches were applied. Respecting subject area, the main focus has been on knowledge management, information technology and human resources, and research level was often organizational and individual. On this basis, solutions have been proposed for the quality promotion of scientific production based on gender, geographical and methodological justice consideration.