Accreditation by EAPAA is based on a decision by the EAPAA Accreditation Committee that a programme “meets the criteria for accreditation sufficiently”. The evaluation of the programme must show “substantial conformity” to the standards.

The formal criteria used for this decision can be found under the Downloads tab in the Accreditation category.
The EAPAA criteria for accreditation are in line with the guidelines of ENQA and INQAHEE, were inspired by the accreditation criteria of NASPAA, and formed as an important source for the ‘Standards on Excellence in Public Administration Education and Training’ produced by an IASIA/UNDESA taskforce.

An institution that want a programme to be accredited by EAPAA, has to be located, or delivering a public administration programme, in Europe, where Europe consists of all countries that belong to the Council of Europe plus Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan , Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

The following is a short summary of the (most important) criteria. The criteria can be grouped into several categories:

Mission and overall policies

• Mission of the institution
• Mission of the programme
• Personnel policy

Curriculum

• Academic level consistent with degree level
• Domain: Public Administration (see remarks below on core components)
• Multidisciplinarity
• Relation to practice (including internships)
• Mission-based curriculum content 
• Consistent and coherent curriculum
• Mission-based didactics

Quality system

• Quality assessment of courses and curriculum
• Continuous quality improvement
• Quality assurance
• Continuous innovation
• With participation of the field/employers, graduates and students

Faculty (teaching staff)

• Faculty quantity (core faculty)
• Faculty quality (didactical, research, degrees)
• Internationalisation
• Programme jurisdiction
• Gender

Other

• Admission of students (mission-based; gender & minorities)
• Student assessment in line with objectives and didactics
• Support services and facilities (budget, library, classrooms, support staff, offices, ICT
• Student services (registration, advice, guidance)
• Public relations

Core components of the public administration curriculum
The curriculum should express the general idea of public administration as a multidisciplinary programme, with the purpose of preparing students for professional academic level roles in the public sector in democratic and legal states. All components of the curriculum should be justified with respect to their quality and consistency with the mission of the programme.

The core curriculum provides a thorough teaching of the basic concepts, theories, methods and history (classics) of Public Administration on the level of the programme (bachelor or master). The curriculum should contain the basics of the following disciplines:

• economy, including public finance
• law, including administrative law
• political sciences, including policy studies
• sociology, including public management
• research methods
• informatics
• philosophy, including ethics
  

However, these requirements do not prescribe specific courses. Neither do they imply that equal time should be spent on each discipline.

Important in a high quality public administration curriculum is the attention given to the interrelationships between the disciplines.