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Fu De Lin was born in Kuling (later to be the capital of Chang Kai-shek's Kuomintang government), China, on July 3, 1917. Frederick Warren Riggs died on February 9, 2008, in Honolulu, Hawaii. Confused? He is the same person, whom we knew affectionately and reverentially as Fred Riggs of comparative and development administration fame.
Fred's father must have been prescient in giving him the Chinese name. For one, for someone born in China, a Chinese name is proper in that the person would easily fit into that society. For another, the name turned out to be apt if one looks at the entire life of Fred. "Fu" in Chinese denotes a blessed person, and "De" suggests a virtuous individual. ("Lin" is a common name that is of little significance in this context.)
To write an exposition on Fred's life and his academic contributions would take volumes. Some have actually earned doctoral degrees doing so (Sharma 1992). This is a short piece expressing my deep-seated reverential feelings. Other admiring colleagues join me in the pages that follow.
Though born in China, Fred could not be Chinese, given that country's law.1 Having lived there for 18 years, and attending Nanking University, Fred returned to the United States to study at the University of Illinois (where he earned his bachelor's degree in 1938), and promptly admitted to having had a culture shock.
Fred was not trained in public administration (either as a discipline or as a profession). He got his master's degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (1941). His PhD thesis (Columbia University, 1948) was in international relations, with a minor in Chinese and Western philosophy. But that study incidentally led him to examine the Chinese Exclusionary Acts, and thus began the long and great journey into the discipline of public administration that led him to become the contemporary towering giant in comparative and development administration.
He was a humanist. His Web site carried the logo, "Above all nations is humanity." He did not serve in the army during World War II, as he was a conscientious objector. Instead, he joined the Civilian Service Corps, working first in the woods of New Hampshire, then serving as an attendant in a private mental hospital in Vermont,...