SAMPLE EXAM QUESTIONS FOR COMPARATIVE PUBLIC
MANAGEMENT
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1 . Which of the following is the main purpose of comparative
public management?
A. to discover where American practices can be applied best
B. to discover where foreign practices can be imported
C. to expand upon British and French practices
D. to focus on growth, reform, and capacity building*
2. Who was the scholar of cameralism that early public
management is indebted to?
A. Aristotle
B. Machiavelli
C. Plato
D. von Justi*
3. Which scholar most helped to shift the focus from public
interest to the public good?
A. Dahl
B. Kettl
C. Waldo*
D. Wilson
4. Which school of thought is most responsible for rejection
of Keynesian economics?
A. Austrian school*
B. Australian school
C. Chicago school
D. Detroit school
5. So-called "Rogernomics" was an idea which emerged out of
which country or place?
A. Austria
B. Australia*
C. Hong Kong
D. Singapore
6. What former Vice President is associated with the "Hammer
Awards?"
A. Agnew
B. Cheney
C. Ford
D. Gore*
7. Governance is to Good Governance as:
A. structure is to function
B. accountability is to transparency
C. reform is to capacity building*
D. principal is to agent
8. Which type of society is most known for a "lumping it"
approach to social problems?
A. folk-communal*
B. urban-commercial
C. urban-industrial
D. bureaucratic
9. Which type of legal system has the oldest corpus of
written specialized legal knowledge?
A. common law
B. civil law*
C. socialist
D. Islamic
10. The "Asiatic mode of production" refers to what?
A. the boom economy of Japan and Taiwan
B. low wages with a hard work ethic
C. the way communist governments support business
D. a despotic form of early government*
11. Which thesis in comparative criminology is the one which
is associated with places with little or no crime?
A. colonization
B. urbanization
C. synomie*
D. criminology of liberation
12. Which country has more anti-terrorism laws, relative to
its size, than any other country?
A. Egypt
B. Great Britain*
C. Somalia
D. United States
13. The "yo-yo effect" is a phenomenon most associated with
which aspect of governance?
A. homeland security*
B. immigration
C. transportation
D. welfare
14. Which country in recent years has embraced rehabilitation
as a counterterrorism strategy?
A. France
B. Germany
C. Israel
D. Saudi Arabia*
15. Most countries in the world have larger bureaucracies
than the United States.
A. True*
B. False
16. A "middle-range theory" of bureaucracy would focus upon
what unit of analysis?
A. individuals
B. groups
C. organizations*
D. nations
17. The "higher civil service" of a bureaucracy refers to
what?
A. executives and ministers
B. elite high-ranking employees*
C. "knowledgeables"
D. stakeholders
18. According to Max Weber, what type of authority is most
characteristic of bureaucracy?
A. charismatic
B. traditional
C. legal-rational*
D. horizontal
19. Who led the scientific management movement in the 20th
century?
A. Bernard
B. Gulick
C. Taylor*
D. Weber
20. Which theory of bureaucratic politics has been the
predominant one in American thought?
A. politics-administration dichotomy*
B. iron triangle theory
C. issue network theory
D. principal-agent theory
21. The Japanese practice of "gaiatsu" refers to what?
A. bureaucrats who work long hours
B. hidden activism by bureaucrats*
C. party-controlled bureaucracy
D. Hegelian civil society
22. Which one of Gabriel Almond's functions is the first
place interest groups exert an influence?
A. political socialization
B. political communication*
C. interest articulation
D. interest aggregation
23. Which pattern-variable from Parsonian sociology is most
associated with attempts to be both traditional and modern?
A. diffuseness-specificity*
B. universalism-particularism
C. ascription-achievement
D. affectivity-affective neutrality
24. Which type of political system usually exists in symbolic
form only?
A. theocracy
B. democracy
C. monarchy*
D. military
25. The majoritarian system known as the Westminster model
has all of the following EXCEPT:
A. two-party elections
B. one-party executive
C. unicameral legislature
D. strong judiciary*
26. Presidentialist systems generally have stronger cabinets
than parliamentary systems.
A. True
B. False*
27. Which component in the general organizational model
usually is the most specific for measuring outcomes?
A. mission
B. goals
C. objectives*
D. behavior
28. The "Roshomon effect" is likely to occur in decoupled
organizations because there are subenvironments.
A. True *
B. False
29. Which of the following would not qualify as a full-blown
organization?
A. A police labor union
B. General Motors
C. A men's bridge club *
D. The Department of Defense
30. The pyramidal structure has which of the following
characteristics?
A. Important decisions are made throughout the pyramid
B. Nearly all contacts take the form of orders going up and
reports of results going down
C. Superiors have a limited span of control, supervising only
a limited number of people
D. Personnel at very few levels have contact only with their
boss above them and subordinates below them *
31. Fayol's "gang-plank" principle deals with what kind of
communication?
A. downward
B. upward
C. horizontal *
D. vertical
32 .Human relations management began with studies conducted at
A. Bethlehem Steel
B. Harvard Business School
C. Western Electric Company *
D. University of California, Berkeley
33. The "Hawthorne effect" usually produces approximately
what increase in productivity?
A. 50%
B. 100% *
C. 150%
D. 200%
34. Who invented the idea of servant-leadership?
A. Chris Argyris
B. Warren Bennis
C. Keith Davis
D. Robert Greenleaf*
35. Civil service reform came to America from India primarily
through what vehicle?
A. the French Declaration of Rights
B. the French Foreign Legion
C. the Pendleton Act*
D. the Hoover Commission
36. The French equivalent of a Supreme Court is called what?
A. the gouvernement
B. the gendarme
C. the Conseil d'Etat*
D. the ministry
37. Who controls the armed forces in France?
A. the President
B. the Prime Minister*
C. the Secretary-General
D. the Minister of Defense
38. What is the most powerful political institution in
Germany?
A. the Bundestag*
B. the Bundesrat
C. the Constitutional Court
D. the Kratzenstein
39. A "Jamaica traffic light" coalition would involve how
many main political parties or other coalitions?
A. two
B. three
C. four*
D. ten
40. Which of the following terms is the most acceptable term
for rule by a few?
A. oligarchy*
B. plutocracy
C. aristocracy
D. kleptocracy
41. Which country in the world claims to be the world's only
meritocracy?
A. Australia
B. China
C. Singapore*
D. Thailand
42. The caudillo pattern of government is associated with
which other political term or event?
A. theocracy
B. junta*
C. polyarchy
D. khoudi
43. Who is arguably the most important and influential part
of Iranian government?
A. the Assembly of Experts
B. the Parliament
C. the Council of Guardians*
D. the Expediency Council
44. Pillarization is associated with which country,
primarily?
A. the Netherlands*
B. Spain
C. Turkey
D. United States
45. There is no consensus on what groups form a civic culture
in a society.
A. True*
B. False
46. Who wrote the book Bowling Alone?
A. Brown
B. Cauldwell
C. Putnam*
D. Strong
47. Which of the following measures of civic culture is
really a measure of civic engagement?
A. regular voting
B. boycotting
C. writing letters to the editor
D. raising money for charity*
48. Human capital is to social capital as:
A. experience is to character*
B. large is to small
C. indirect is to direct
D. round is to square
49. Which of the following is an example of grassroots
democracy?
A. wikigovernment
B. total quality management
C. privatization
D. Abahlali baseMjondolo*
50. The Ombudsman office is a practice which originated in
what region of the world?
A. North America
B. Latin America
C. Scandinavia*
D. South Asia
51. Which of the following is NOT normally part of the
meaning of modernization?
A. plasticity
B. variability
C. monotony*
D. veridicality
52. Which of the following are ways modernization can go
wrong?
A. too much outsourcing can occur
B. too many political parties may be allowed
C. government may grow too big
D. all of the above*
53. Which economic measure is the standard way for comparing
the economic health of countries?
A. GNP
B. GDP*
C. per capita income
D. productivity
54. Who developed the formula for political development where
PD = M + I?
A. Friedrich
B. Huntington
C. Jaguaribe*
D. Kautsky
55. Historically, the idea of legislation having a sunset
clause goes back to when?
A. the Justinian Code*
B. the Magna Carta
C. the American Revolution
D. the French Revolution
56. Electoral politics in developed countries tends to
involve the media more than in underdeveloped countries.
A. True*
B. False
57. Which country is known for practicing a
first-past-the-post (FPTP) plurality system for elections?
A. Australia
B. Great Britain*
C. Romania
D. Uganda
58. Which country has the highest personal income tax rate in
the world?
A. Belgium*
B. Canada
C. Switzerland
D. Turkey
59. Welfare state is to regulatory state as:
A. loyalty is to disloyalty
B. deserving is to undeserving
C. experimenting is to tinkering*
D. failure is to success
60. Which of the following is a phrase best describing what a
political "regime" is?
A. a disaggregated club of policymakers*
B. a closely-knit group of oligarchs
C. those who are "connected" to executive power
D. those who benefit from current policies
61. What kind of elite is left behind from previous political
administrations?
A. superelite
B. counter-elite
C. remnant elite
D. rump elite*
62. Which of the following countries has never been governed
by the Christian Democrat party?
A. Germany
B. Italy
C. Belgium
D. France*
63. In Afghanistan, a jirga (or jirgah) refers to
what?
A. a system of criminal courts
B. a loose network of family clans
C. an assembly, council, or meeting of tribal elders*
D. the legislative branch of government
64. Most experts say Pakistan's "on again, off again" problem
with democracy stems from what?
A. post-industrialism
B. post-colonialism*
C. anti-globalization
D. crony capitalism
65. Which "old" institution is the primary one that "new
institutionalists" say a less developed country (LDC) should not neglect?
A. property rights*
B. insurance
C. transportation
D. religious freedom
66. Which model of sustainable development first embraced a
greater return on investment in labor productivity, via education mainly, as a
way to help a developing country out of poverty?
A. Harrod-Domar growth model
B. Solow growth model*
C. structural adjustment loans
D. new institutionalism
67. "Foreign aid in the national interest" is the motto of
which development agency?
A. USAID*
B. World Bank
C. International Monetary Fund
D. United Nations Development Programme
68. What is the main way that countries manage to evade
economic sanctions?
A. they turn to Communist countries for aid and trade
B. they carry out bribery and black market operations*
C. they reduce consumption via austerity measures
D. they make deals with multinational corporations
69. Which of the following statements best describes the
meaning of autarky?
A. an economy that is self-sufficient and does not take part
in international trade*
B. an economy that is protectionistic and requires large
tariffs
C. an economy that is so open to imports that it devalues its
exports
D. an economy on the verge of monetary collapse
70. While the sources of WTO law are many, the primary source
is what?
A. international norms of cooperation
B. the jus cogens aspect of international law
C. the Marrakesh Agreement*
D. United Nations security council power
Last updated: Sept. 07, 2008
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