Theory means a formal statement of rules on which a subject of study is based or ideas which are suggested to explain a fact or an event or,more generally, an opinion or explanation. Administrative theory consist of those concets given by experienced administrators or obseervation of the operational situations in administration,they may be divided from comparative studies or they maybe ideas and opinions of intellectuals. Administrative theories are those set of theories which highlight different facts of administrative activity.
EVOLUTION OF ADMINISTRATIVE THEORY:
Although administration has existed since the organise state came into existence,it brgan to attract the scholars only in the late part of the 19TH century and since then it has developped in different directions In ancient India,Kautilya’s Arthashastra discussed principles amd machinery of Public Administration,the Arthashastra is considered as the first textbook on public administration. Woodrow Wilson,the Father of the discipline of Public Administrationgave us the concept of the Politics-Administration Dichotomy in his attempt to reform the American political system leading to the birth of the discipline of Public Administration. he believed in the operational and business side of administration and wanted it to be free from politics. The classical theories of administration developped in the U.S.A from the 1880’s to the late 1930’s. The classical theorists were Henry Fayol, Luther Gullick, Mooney, Riley etc.. all these writers believed in the existence of certain universal administrative principle which could make organisation function more efficiently and effctively. The classical theory has four features- impersonality, division of labour, hierarchy and efficiency. F.W Taylor,a pioneer in management science conducted studies in the early part of the 20th