Another Chapter in Michigan Civil Service Reform

1941 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 76-82
Author(s):  
Edward H. Litchfield
Keyword(s):  
Civil Service ◽  
Service System ◽  
Constitutional Amendment ◽  
Public Employment ◽  
Civil Service Reform ◽  
State Constitution ◽  
Democratic Administration ◽  
Complete Reversal ◽  
History Of ◽  
Merit System

The civil service scene in Michigan has changed so rapidly in the last few years that it has been difficult for persons in other areas to keep abreast of developments. Thus, while in 1936 Michigan knew little of merit in public employment, 1937 found her in the vanguard of the reform movement. In that year, the recommendations of a study commission were embodied in a comprehensive civil service system by a Democratic administration. The year 1939 brought an almost complete reversal of policy with the passage of a Republican “ripper” act. Today another development is in the process of maturing. A civil service amendment to the state constitution was adopted in the November election of 1940.It is not the purpose of this article to review the details of the history of Michigan's civil service movement, for this has been done elsewhere. Suffice it to say that Michigan's experience with spoils politics was neither better nor worse than that of other jurisdictions; the recommendations of the Civil Service Study Commission, of which Dr. James K. Pollock was chairman, are now well known; the excellence of the state's merit system under William Brownrigg has also been generally recognised.However, three developments remain to be discussed: first, the contents of the “ripper” legislation; second, the effects of that legislation upon the present personnel situation; third, the proposed constitutional amendment.

The Changing Face of Georgia's Merit System: Results from an Employee Attitude Survey in the Georgia Department of Juvenile Justice

2003 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 267-278 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles W. Gossett
Keyword(s):  
Organizational Commitment ◽  
Juvenile Justice ◽  
Civil Service ◽  
Service System ◽  
Civil Service Reform ◽  
Attitude Survey ◽  
New Employees ◽  
Merit System ◽  
The Impact ◽  
At Will

In 1996, the state of Georgia passed a radical civil service reform law that, in effect, removed all new employees from the traditional civil service system and made them “at-will” employees. Additionally, many functions, such as recruitment and classification, were decentralized to the operating agencies. This study attempts to review the impact of these changes on employees in one of the agencies, the Department of Juvenile Justice. A comparison is made of the attitudes of employees who are covered by civil service regulations and those who are not, principally with respect to organizational commitment and loyalty. The results of the survey suggest that, to date, the impact of these reforms on commitment and loyalty is not significant.

The Myth of Bureaucratic Neutrality: Institutionalized Inequity in Local Government Hiring

2019 ◽  
Vol 40 (3) ◽  
pp. 516-531 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shannon Portillo ◽  
Domonic Bearfield ◽  
Nicole Humphrey
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Review ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Civil Service ◽  
Service System ◽  
Technical Skills ◽  
Hiring Practices ◽  
Public Employment ◽  
Political Patronage ◽  
Early Testing ◽  
Founding Myth

As a field, we often relate merit and neutrality to the technical skills needed to be the “best” candidate for a job, but that was not necessarily what civil service reformers had in mind. The civil service system was meant to replace widespread political patronage, but the myth around the origins of the civil service system masked inequalities built into early testing requirements and institutionalized racial inequities in hiring practices. In this article, we argue the founding myth of bureaucratic neutrality was so powerful that it continues to reverberate in our field. We trace the current reverberations of the myth of neutrality through modern hiring practices and the contemporary legal landscape. By doing this, we present a systematic review of this rationalized myth in public employment, using an institutionalism framework. As the myth of bureaucratic neutrality continues to permeate decision-making, policy creation, and implementation, it will continue to institutionalize inequity within the field.

Politicisation, professionalisation, or both? Hungary's civil service system

2007 ◽  
Vol 40 (3) ◽  
pp. 343-362 ◽  
Author(s):  
György Gajduschek
Keyword(s):  
Survey Data ◽  
Civil Service ◽  
Service System ◽  
European Countries ◽  
East European ◽  
Scholarly Publications ◽  
Merit System

This paper aims to determine where the Hungarian civil service system might be situated on an imaginary merit system – spoils system scale. In doing so, the Hungarian system is analyzed from two angles. Firstly, regulation is scrutinized as it is manifested in the Civil Service Act. Secondly, practice is examined relying on available statistical and survey data. The author argues that, contrary to the conclusions of most of scholarly publications, the Hungarian Law is a pseudo-merit system law, not in fact preventing the prevalence of a spoils system. Practice generally reveals, however, features of a modestly politicized system with signs of increasing professionalization. The last two sections investigate the potential explanations for these somewhat surprising findings and whether the findings for the Hungarian civil service may be generalized to some or most of the Central and East European countries.

scholarly journals Civil-Service Reforms and Communist Legacy: The Case of Slovakia

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 177-199
Author(s):  
Katarína Staroňová
Keyword(s):  
Civil Service ◽  
Eastern European ◽  
Civil Service Reform ◽  
High Turnover ◽  
Human Resource Management System ◽  
Resource Management System ◽  
Limited Success ◽  
Stream System ◽  
Eastern European Countries ◽  
Merit System

AbstractCivil-service reforms in Central and Eastern European countries (CEEC) in the last decade have focused on various tools that would decrease politicization and increase the professionalization of civil service, in other words introducing a merit system in the civil service. At the same time, there was a need to attract professionals from practice into the civil service to design and implement other necessary sectoral reforms. Different countries have undertaken different trajectories of reforms. To some extent, Slovakia responded to these challenges and introduced HR reforms in civil service in order to streamline the recruitment and motivate young qualified candidates, reduce high turnover and create senior civil service, such as the “fast stream system” and “nominated civil service”. However, these had only limited success. The creation of functioning human-resource management system and approaches is undoubtedly the main area of failure in civil-service reform, not only in Slovakia but in most CEE countries. This paper seeks to understand these reforms from a historical institutionalist perspective, emphasizing the influence of institutional (communist) legacies on current empirical patterns.

scholarly journals The Causes and Status of Civil Service Reforms in Korea

2002 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 67-76
Author(s):  
Geunjoo Lee
Keyword(s):  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Civil Service ◽  
Service System ◽  
System Reform ◽  
Civil Service Reform ◽  
New Public ◽  
The Status ◽  
Environmental Causes ◽  
Major Factors

This paper seeks to evaluate the status of civil service reform, which followed the prescription of the so-called neo-liberalism and new public management. The first part of the paper explores the environmental causes that brought about the recent civil service system reform in Korea. Major factors that shape the details of civil service reform are examined. The second part of the paper reviews the reform effort and assesses the outcomes of the reform programs. The tentative evaluation shows that some civil service reform programs produced noticeable achievement while others are in need of continouos attention.

Outlawing the Spoils: A History of the Civil Service Reform Movement, 1865-1883

1962 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 281
Author(s):  
Geoffrey T. Blodgett ◽  
Ari Hoogenboom
Keyword(s):  
Civil Service ◽  
Reform Movement ◽  
Civil Service Reform ◽  
History Of

Civil Service Reform Is Dead: Long Live Civil Service Reform

2020 ◽  
pp. 009102602098202
Author(s):  
James R. Thompson
Keyword(s):  
Civil Service ◽  
Service System ◽  
Punctuated Equilibrium ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Federal Employees ◽  
Civil Service Reform ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Terrorist Incident ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Dynamic Element

The federal civil service system is widely regarded as obsolete. The pay of federal employees bears little relation to the market, narrowly defined jobs hamper the assignment of tasks, and byzantine hiring rules impede the procurement of needed skills. The theory of punctuated equilibrium holds that an episode of rapid and dramatic change portends, that the pressures for change will build and that some exogenous event will trigger a reform event similar to what happened in the mid-2000s subsequent to the 9/11 terrorist incident. Does another episode of punctuated equilibrium impend or is change more likely to occur in an incremental manner? Distinctive features of the policy subsystem make evident the improbability of another episode of “grand reform.” Recent developments further highlight a dynamic element whereby small-scale adjustments are being employed to address some of the system’s most dysfunctional aspects.

scholarly journals Context as a Factor in Senior Civil Service Reform: Opinions and Attitudes of Senior Executives in Lithuania

2016 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 124-152
Author(s):  
Remigijus Civinskas ◽  
Mindaugas Kaselis ◽  
Saulius Pivoras
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Research ◽  
Civil Service ◽  
Service System ◽  
Research Data ◽  
Policy Formation ◽  
Civil Servants ◽  
Senior Executives ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Civil Service Reform ◽  
Role Identities

Abstract This article analyses the contextual factors and their impact on the planned creation of senior civil service (henceforth, SCS) within the Lithuanian civil service system since 2008. Based on a survey of Lithuanian senior executives’ conducted in 2014 and qualitative semi-structured interviews, the aim of this article is to reveal and explain incentives and obstacles of SCS reform in Lithuania. Empirical research data clarifies attitudes of senior civil servants and their role perceptions. Senior executives’ attitudes towards the establishment of the SCS system were clearly positive. However, the research data reveals that supportive attitudes depend on the perception of the roles of senior executives. Senior civil servants who perceived themselves firstly as actors in policy formation and policy implementers were much more favourable towards the creation of SCS than senior civil servants with other role identities.

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