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Evidence of public service motivation of social workers in China

department of public administration, School of International and Public Affairs, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China

To investigate how generalizable public service motivation (PSM) observed in Western society is to China and examine the instrumentality of public service motivation, two studies were conducted independently. In Study 1, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) is implemented to test the existence of PSM based on 99 social workers in Region A of one city located in Eastern China. In Study 2, another CFA process is implemented to confirm the construct validity of PSM, based on 474 social workers in Region B of the same city. In Study 2, we evaluated the instrumentality of PSM. These studies not only provide evidence for the construct validity of PSM, but also produce interesting results that relate to the history and institutional background of Chinese social work.

Points for practitioners

Results of the study have confirmed the generalizability of public service motivation (PSM) observed in Western society in China and examined the instrumentality of the construct in China. The results identify several key implications for professionals working in social work management and administration: (1) PSM can be used as an additional tool to recruit and select individuals who are best suited for social work; (2) For management in social work or other public sectors, PSM could be as a direction in training and development; (3) More importantly, PSM could provide additional view of incentives in social work or other public sectors.

Key Words: administrative science • ethics • human resources management • personnel policies • public management • service delivery

International Review of Administrative Sciences, Vol. 75, No. 2, 349-366 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/0020852309104180


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