My Eras Tour in the Untortured Public Administration Department (Ben’s Version)

The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ASPA as an organization.

By Benjamin Deitchman
June 3, 2024

Music star and cultural icon Taylor Swift and I, a government employee, are very similar. Ms. Swift’s musical career was getting started in Nashville around 2005 when I graduated from college, began my master’s degree in a public administration program and worked in Washington, DC. We have both continued our journeys toward professional growth and development as we’ve blossomed into impactful adult Millennials. Obviously, Ms. Swift’s successes are far more pronounced, but that’s not going to stop me from comparing myself to her for the purposes of this self-indulgent analysis of contemporary life in the public service.

We all have our own eras, whether or not we find ourselves headlining The Eras Tour. Taylor Swift’s eras represent her various albums which have directly mapped to her life story since she was a teenager.  My eras in public policy and public administration began with my master’s student era and continued on to my early career era, doctoral student era, academic era and now move through my governmental era. In the modern professional environment, where people regularly switch roles and organizations, our different eras reflect our changing outlooks and goals. Even individuals in stable, long-term positions will find themselves in different eras due to the internal and external dynamics of public and nonprofit institutions.

My eras are unique to me, but, following Ms. Swift’s lead, I will now share more about them, because I too see myself as eminently relatable. In my master’s student era I was still drawing from my youth in understanding the key concepts of public service. In my 2006 journal article, “A March of Nickels and Dimes for Recycling: A Study of the Present ‘State’ of Bottle-Bills,” I began with the anecdote, “Bottle and can deposits were a way of life when I was growing up in New York State. When the neighborhood kids and I opened a lemonade stand on my front lawn, we accepted bottles and cans as a method of payment.” My early career era working inside the Beltway was challenging and educational as I transitioned from a novice to someone directly engaged in policymaking activities.

In my second student era, this time in a doctoral program, I was pursuing knowledge based on the key theories of the field. My dissertation, “Why U.S. States Became Leaders in Climate And Energy Policy: Innovation Through Competition In Federalism,” opened with a discussion of the Federalist Papers and Justice Louis Brandies’s famous discussion of American states as “laboratories of democracy,” incorporating the key literature and attempting to communicate my abilities. In my next era, my academic era, I was teaching and advancing new conceptualizations. I described my book from this time, Climate and Clean Energy Policy: State Institutions and Economic Implications, as a “rigorous analysis” that “offers researchers, students and policymakers with practical information to advance their understanding of these options in the policy process.”    

My current era, as I seek to make contributions in my practitioner role, coincides with a key era in my personal life: my parenting era. I certainly have a much more siloed work-life balance than Ms. Swift, whose lyrics reflect her relationships and personal feelings. In fact, it’s often strange for me when circumstances are such that my job requires public testimony and my friends and family choose to watch the proceedings.  My significant other may not quite be there in person, as Ms. Swift and her professional football player boyfriend Travis Kelce are at each other’s games and performances, but I’m still aware of the live streaming of my appearance. 

Despite the often technical and objective nature of my work, as with Ms. Swift, my humanity is part of everything that I do. As I wrote in a 2017 column, “Parenting and Public Administration,” “Fourteen months into my time as a father I am recognizing how my most important job is impacting my perspectives and approaches to my paying job. It is a cliché, but raising a child changes everything, including a career in the public service and a parent’s relationship with government and society.” Like most people, despite living in the same city with the same job, I can divide the past 8 years into the sub-eras of pre-Covid and post-Covid, but I still struggle to fully grasp the magnitude of that global experience.

There is other policy relevant of research and analysis of Taylor Swift’s economic and intellectual rights impact on the post-Covid music industry and her role in shaping American political positions. I wrote of her ongoing romantic relationship back in November in “Taylor Swift Should Not Date a Climate Scientist: The Perils of Fame in Policymaking” stating, “People should enjoy Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce for their immense gifts on the stage and football field and the intrigue of their burgeoning relationship.” So yes, I will continue to enjoy her music, but I will also continue to relate the larger world to my world. I thank you, dear reader, for indulging “my covert narcissism I disguise as altruism like some kind of Congressman,” to quote Taylor Swift’s “Anti-Hero,” and reaching the end of my tortured prose on this topic.

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Author: Benjamin Deitchman is not a Grammy winning singer, songwriter, and performer.  Dr. Deitchman is a public policy professional in Atlanta, Georgia.  He is currently working to develop a book connecting public policy, public administration, and popular culture to introduce and inspire the next generation in our field.  His email address is [email protected].     

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