In third world countries a key to the course of nation building is the modernization of the organizational and administrative infrastructures that drive the development process. The focus of this paper is the ministry of education (MOE), an institution that has found its role changed dramatically since midcentury in most Latin American nations. In order to promote the modernization of management activities in ministries, it is first essential to understand their existing patterns of operation. Toward this objective, the paper presents a methodological framework for a field study approach. Specifically, the paper explores some of the issues involved in using a participant-observation field research methodology in studying major policy issues reaching from the top to the bottom of the MOE hierarchy. The paper stresses the importance of such activities as (1) being sensitive to the subtleties of the ideal/real dualism, (2) responding to the Latin American concerns of academic colonialism, (3) beginning study at the bottom of the hierarchy (local school level) and working upwards, (4) shifting from a sustained to a transitory methodology as the researcher moves up the hierarchy, and (5) looking for similarities and differences between selected regions or states in order to get closer to a national perspective. (Author/JM)