Tales of two cities : the administrative facade of social security
By: Gibson, Ed
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ArticlePublisher: Thousand Oaks : SAGE, September 2003Administration & Society 35, 4, p. 408-443Abstract: This article presents history (stories) about a political landmark--Social Security--long topical in the discourse on societal versus individual responsibility to provide for retirement and disability. These stories are necessarily abbreviated and simplified because of their subjects: buildings--the locations of the Social Security Administration and it´s percursors in Washington, DC, and Baltimore. The perspectives of the built environment and of sociotechnical integration provide a distinct vantage on the program´s growth into our nation´s insurer; on the tensions between principle and compromise, original purpose and ultimate achievement, and neutral competence and political belief; and on the evalution of intent, preserved in unwritten artifacts, into mature program principles
This article presents history (stories) about a political landmark--Social Security--long topical in the discourse on societal versus individual responsibility to provide for retirement and disability. These stories are necessarily abbreviated and simplified because of their subjects: buildings--the locations of the Social Security Administration and it´s percursors in Washington, DC, and Baltimore. The perspectives of the built environment and of sociotechnical integration provide a distinct vantage on the program´s growth into our nation´s insurer; on the tensions between principle and compromise, original purpose and ultimate achievement, and neutral competence and political belief; and on the evalution of intent, preserved in unwritten artifacts, into mature program principles
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