Administrative history is a historiographic field which looks at the history of state administrations and bureaucracies. Originally considered a sub-field of Administrative Sciences that was intended to improve contemporary governance, administrative history has become an increasingly separate field.^[1] Administrative historians study the changes in administrative ideologies and administrative law while also looking at civil servants and the relationship between government and society.^[2] It is related to political and constitutional history. The discipline is most common in France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Italy.^[3] In 1965, when fields like social history were becoming ever more popular, G. R. Elton (then a fellow of Clare College, Cambridge) defended administrative history as the only field which can explain how the machinery of government actually worked in the past.^[4]

Academic journals which specialise in administrative history include:

• Jahrbuch für europäische Verwaltungsgeschichte (JEV)^[1]

Historians researching the medieval and early modern periods have begun to reexplore the possibilities of administrative history. This movement has been described as the "New Administrative History".^[5] It embraces a broad range of approaches, including interdisciplinary and theoretical work – as exemplified by John Sabapathy – and also more traditional institutional approaches, revisiting the methods of influential administrative historians such as T. F. Tout and G. R. Elton.^[6]

• Business history
• Institutional anthropology
• Prosopography
• Constitutional history

• Raadschelders, J.C.N. (1994). "Administrative History: Contents, Meaning and Usefulness". International Review of Administrative Sciences. 60: 117–29. doi:10.1177/002085239406000107. S2CID 144037125.
• Raadschelders, J.C.N. (1998). Handbook of Administrative History. London: Transaction Publishers. ISBN 978-1-56000-315-1.

• Constitutional and administrative history at "Making History" (Institute of Historical Research)