scholarly journals Policy Advisory Capability in Papua New Guinea's Central Government: Evaluation, Implications and Lessons

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Lawrence L Sause
Keyword(s):  
Public Service ◽  
Central Government ◽  
Policy Coordination ◽  
Policy Transfer ◽  
Policy Advice ◽  
The Political ◽  
Executive Council ◽  
Weak State ◽  
Policy Issues ◽  
The Government

<p>There has been mounting criticism (generally associated with the "weak state thesis") of the inability of the Papua New Guinea (PNG) public service to discharge its various policy formulation and implementation tasks. Such criticisms tend to be generalised in nature. Information about performance and the operational deficiencies of specific departments and policy domains derived from scholarly research has been sparse. Against this background, and using as a measure key elements of capability from the development administration literature, this study examines the state of policy advisory capability in three key central agencies within the PNG central government; identifies key constraints on the agencies' ability to provide comprehensive and reliable advice; and then proposes policy intervention measures aimed at strengthening capability. The agencies play a very influential and significant role in the government advisory machine and comprise the Department of Finance and Treasury (DF&T), the Department of Prime Minister and National Executive Council (DPM&NEC) and the Department of Personnel Management (DPM). Analysis is primarily based on the responses from the policy staff of the lead policy units in each department. Such responses have been gauged using a questionnaire survey and indepth interviews in early and late 2002 in Port Moresby. This study shows that the problems affecting policy advisory capability are, in most cases, pervasive and systemic. Such a loss in capability tends to arise from a variety of interlocking (and often interwoven) problems from both the political and the administrative and organisational dimensions within which policy advice is developed and delivered. On a broader level, the weakening of policy advisory capability raises important implications for the organisation and delivery of quality and timely advice. In particular, there is a risk that policy issues will not be comprehensively assessed taking into account the available evidence, views of parties concerned and, most important, the implications arising from various policy options provided to ministers and the National Executive Council (NEC) (cabinet). There is, therefore, a risk of ministers and NEC being ill advised on policy issues. This, in turn, may affect the executive branch's effectiveness in policymaking. The deterioration in the policy advisory capability of the three key agencies also gives rise to doubts about whether the three agencies can effectively maintain their key functions of control, monitoring and oversight and policy coordination across the PNG public service. There is a risk of the centre of the PNG government losing its ability to control and steer the government machine. This conclusion is consistent with the existing anecdotal evidence of a deteriorating capability of the PNG public service and, to some extent supports the weak state thesis advanced in the literature. This study on the ground of three key agencies demonstrates, however, that the political environment is not the only cause of weak performance by the PNG public service. That is a function of a variety of interlocking political and administrative and organisational capability factors. An improvement in policy advice capability in PNG will require attention to the several systemic factors identified in the study. Using insights from the policy transfer literature this study shows that policy lessons from other jurisdictions could be drawn on to improve capability in policy advice in PNG.</p>

scholarly journals Policy Advisory Capability in Papua New Guinea's Central Government: Evaluation, Implications and Lessons

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Lawrence L Sause
Keyword(s):  
Public Service ◽  
Central Government ◽  
Policy Coordination ◽  
Policy Transfer ◽  
Policy Advice ◽  
The Political ◽  
Executive Council ◽  
Weak State ◽  
Policy Issues ◽  
The Government

<p>There has been mounting criticism (generally associated with the "weak state thesis") of the inability of the Papua New Guinea (PNG) public service to discharge its various policy formulation and implementation tasks. Such criticisms tend to be generalised in nature. Information about performance and the operational deficiencies of specific departments and policy domains derived from scholarly research has been sparse. Against this background, and using as a measure key elements of capability from the development administration literature, this study examines the state of policy advisory capability in three key central agencies within the PNG central government; identifies key constraints on the agencies' ability to provide comprehensive and reliable advice; and then proposes policy intervention measures aimed at strengthening capability. The agencies play a very influential and significant role in the government advisory machine and comprise the Department of Finance and Treasury (DF&T), the Department of Prime Minister and National Executive Council (DPM&NEC) and the Department of Personnel Management (DPM). Analysis is primarily based on the responses from the policy staff of the lead policy units in each department. Such responses have been gauged using a questionnaire survey and indepth interviews in early and late 2002 in Port Moresby. This study shows that the problems affecting policy advisory capability are, in most cases, pervasive and systemic. Such a loss in capability tends to arise from a variety of interlocking (and often interwoven) problems from both the political and the administrative and organisational dimensions within which policy advice is developed and delivered. On a broader level, the weakening of policy advisory capability raises important implications for the organisation and delivery of quality and timely advice. In particular, there is a risk that policy issues will not be comprehensively assessed taking into account the available evidence, views of parties concerned and, most important, the implications arising from various policy options provided to ministers and the National Executive Council (NEC) (cabinet). There is, therefore, a risk of ministers and NEC being ill advised on policy issues. This, in turn, may affect the executive branch's effectiveness in policymaking. The deterioration in the policy advisory capability of the three key agencies also gives rise to doubts about whether the three agencies can effectively maintain their key functions of control, monitoring and oversight and policy coordination across the PNG public service. There is a risk of the centre of the PNG government losing its ability to control and steer the government machine. This conclusion is consistent with the existing anecdotal evidence of a deteriorating capability of the PNG public service and, to some extent supports the weak state thesis advanced in the literature. This study on the ground of three key agencies demonstrates, however, that the political environment is not the only cause of weak performance by the PNG public service. That is a function of a variety of interlocking political and administrative and organisational capability factors. An improvement in policy advice capability in PNG will require attention to the several systemic factors identified in the study. Using insights from the policy transfer literature this study shows that policy lessons from other jurisdictions could be drawn on to improve capability in policy advice in PNG.</p>

scholarly journals Minister-Permanent Secretary Relationships: Lessons from Zimbabwe’s Government of national Unity

2014 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 23
Author(s):  
Tawanda Zinyama ◽  
Joseph Tinarwo
Keyword(s):  
Public Administration ◽  
Public Service ◽  
Political Process ◽  
Large Degree ◽  
The State ◽  
Team Work ◽  
The Political ◽  
National Unity ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Government

Public administration is carried out through the public service. Public administration is an instrument of the State which is expected to implement the policy decisions made from the political and legislative processes. The rationale of this article is to assess the working relationships between ministers and permanent secretaries in the Government of National Unity in Zimbabwe. The success of the Minister depends to a large degree on the ability and goodwill of a permanent secretary who often has a very different personal or professional background and whom the minster did not appoint. Here lies the vitality of the permanent secretary institution. If a Minister decides to ignore the advice of the permanent secretary, he/she may risk of making serious errors. The permanent secretary is the key link between the democratic process and the public service. This article observed that the mere fact that the permanent secretary carries out the political, economic and social interests and functions of the state from which he/she derives his/her authority and power; and to which he/she is accountable,  no permanent secretary is apolitical and neutral to the ideological predisposition of the elected Ministers. The interaction between the two is a political process. Contemporary administrator requires complex team-work and the synthesis of diverse contributions and view-points.

scholarly journals Citizen’s Charter a Mechanism for Accountability: An Analysis of India Conditions

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 41-51
Author(s):  
Ramthanpuia Pachuau
Keyword(s):  
Public Service ◽  
Central Government ◽  
Government Policies ◽  
Administrative Reforms ◽  
The People ◽  
Official Statement ◽  
Long Time ◽  
The Government ◽  
Democratic Country

The initiatives of Citizen’s Charter are an effort in solving citizen’s problems that they encounter regularly over a long time while dealing with the government or any other organizations. It is a document of an official statement that ensures the accountability of the organization and their commitment towards the citizen in providing the quality of service. The charter aimed to revolutionize public service by empowering the people who were so long regarded as a silent spectator and a mere receiver on the government policies and programmes. In a democratic country, citizens have become more vocals towards the government responsibilities and they expect the administration not only to respond to their demands but also to foresee their needs in the future. In India, the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances in Government (DARPG) is in charge of organizing, directing, formulating, and operationalizing Citizen's Charters at the Central Government as well as States Government. However, the fulfillment of Citizen’s Charter in India faced many difficulties due to its government bureaucratic structure and resistant to change in its working system.

scholarly journals Stepping Into the Same River Twice? Judicial Independence in Old and New Authoritarianism

2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (7) ◽  
pp. 1316-1326
Author(s):  
Zoltán Szente
Keyword(s):  
Legal System ◽  
Democratic Transition ◽  
Central Government ◽  
Judicial Independence ◽  
Communist Regime ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Forces ◽  
Judicial Administration ◽  
The Government

AbstractThe study seeks to answer the question of whether there are similarities between the methods used to limit judicial independence in Hungary during the last phase of the communist regime, i.e. before the democratic transition, and today, when many scholars believe that an authoritarian transition is taking place in this country. For this purpose, I argue that despite the undeniable fundamental differences between the political and legal system of these two periods, the mechanisms and ways as the independence of judiciary were and are influenced by the government can plausibly be compared. The analysis seems to support this presumption: both the formal instruments and the informal channels of influence in the hands of the ruling political forces show a number of similarities. Thus, even if there are differences in the degree of their application and result, from centralizing the system of judicial administration to replacing court leaders with politically loyal people there are a number of instruments that enable central government to influence the judiciary, while maintaining the appearance of judicial independence.

scholarly journals Post-ISIS Iraq and the Shia Armed Groups

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 122-137
Author(s):  
Kardo Rached ◽  
Ahmed Omar Bali
Keyword(s):  
Central Government ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Environment ◽  
Islamic State ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
Weberian Theory ◽  
Supreme Leader ◽  
The Government ◽  
The City ◽  
Self Defence

The political environment of Iraq in the period from 2011-2014 experienced a great degree of turbulence. Many Sunni tribes in the Anbar, Ramadi and Salahadin regions organized a daily protest against the central government, accusing it of being sectarian. Gradually, these protests become more popular, and the Baghdad government became fearful that it would spread into the other regions of Iraq. In order to control the protests, the government used force, and many were killed. Simultaneously, in Syria, and especially during 2013-2014, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) controlled more land and more people, and to take advantage of the Iraqi people's dissatisfaction with their government, ISIS crossed the border between Iraq and Syria in June 2014. Mosul as the second most heavily populated city was seized by ISIS and the Iraqi army could not fight back, which meant that the Iraqi army retreated from most of the Sunni areas. Even Baghdad, the capital of Iraq, and the city where the central government operates, was threatened. While the Iraqi army was unable to fight against ISIS, the Shia religious supreme leader Al-Sistani called for self-defence and to stand against ISIS. Sistani’s call became a cornerstone for the creation of the so-called Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) with the aim of the fighting against ISIS. In this article, we assess the PMF from different perspectives, for example, using the Weberian theory that the state is the only entity that has a monopoly on violence, considering Ariel Ahram's model of state-sponsored and government-sponsored militias, and finally the devolution of violence to these armed groups.

IMEMO in Early 1990s (continued)

2015 ◽  
pp. 101-110
Author(s):  
P. Cherkasov
Keyword(s):  
Political System ◽  
Central Government ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Crisis ◽  
The Political ◽  
Public Authorities ◽  
General Terms ◽  
Social Liberalism ◽  
The Government ◽  
Soviet Russia

The article analyzes IMEMO activities in 1992–1993, when in Russia, under the influence of both radical economic reforms and drastic weakening of the central government, a deep political crisis emerged and gained a dangerous traction, fraught with the death of a young democracy and even the collapse of the state. Under these conditions, along with economic issues, the politological research came to the fore in IMEMO – the analysis of the country's new political system, the definition of its development vector. The Center of Socio-economic and Socio-political Research of IMEMO headed by German Germanovich Diligenskii played the major role in this work. Analysts of the Center prepared a number of recommendations for public authorities concerning the creation and development of a new democratic political system in Russia. IMEMO experts paid the utmost attention to the nature of the political crisis that arose in the post-Soviet Russia in late 1991, and the ways to overcome it. In January 1993, the results of the study were presented to the discussion at the Academic Council. It was agreed that one of the main causes of the political crisis in the country was the social tensions worsening, as a consequence of the “shocking therapy” conducted by the government of Gaidar in 1992. In the discussion on the political outlook German Diligenskii, rejecting the possibility of the old command-administrative system restoration, substantiated a probability of transformation of the "market democracy" not yet established in Russia into the "authoritarian monopoly or monopoly-bureaucratic system". Noting the disunity of democratic forces, weakness of the entrepreneurial class, largely dependent on the state, Diligenskii formulated a program for uniting all adherents of “arket democracy” under the slogan of "social liberalism", which would take into account Russian specifics. Consolidation of democracy and market economy in Russia is impossible without preservation of the state territorial integrity and consolidation of the central government, with a clear division of functions and powers of its constituent branches. Monopolization (usurpation) of all power by one of the branches – legislative or executive – should not be allowed. The victory of any of them in any case would mean the defeat of democracy. Such was, in general terms, the position of IMEMO in the face of the 1992–1993 political crisis. Acknowledgement. The publication was prepared as part of the President of Russian Federation grant to support the leading scientifi c schools NSh-6452.2014.6.

(2) Convention on the Political Rights of Women, adopted by the seventh session of the General Assembly, December 20, 1952

1953 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 173-175
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
Public Service ◽  
General Assembly ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
The Status ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Right

Desiring to implement the principle of equality of rights for men and women contained in the Charter of the United Nations,Recognizing that everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country directly or through freely chosen representatives, and has the right to equal access to public service in his country, and desiring to equalize the status of men and women in the enjoyment and exercise of political rights, in accordance with the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations and of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights,

scholarly journals Choosing Whom to Target: Horizontal Inequality and the Risk of Civil and Communal Violence

2017 ◽  
Vol 63 (2) ◽  
pp. 528-554 ◽  
Author(s):  
Solveig Hillesund
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Groups ◽  
Central Government ◽  
The Political ◽  
Civil Conflicts ◽  
Communal Violence ◽  
Horizontal Inequality ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Political Exclusion ◽  
The Government ◽  
Horizontal Inequalities

Do different types of inequality spur violence with different targets? This article explores whom violent movements choose to target when they take to arms, by comparing civil conflicts, which target the state, to communal conflicts, which target other ethnic groups. Different types of ethnic group disadvantage relate to conflict through different mechanisms. Political exclusion is expected to promote the choice to target the central government rather than other ethnic groups, while economic disadvantages should increase the risk of both civil and communal conflicts. The different expectations stem from two important differences between political and economic horizontal inequalities: only the government has the authority to change the political distribution, while there can be many avenues to economic redistribution; and blame is more straightforwardly assigned to the government for political than for economic disadvantages. Statistical analysis of 155 politically relevant ethnic groups in Africa (1991–2009) provides support for both propositions.

scholarly journals Trade Union amendment act 2005 and the entrenchment of industrial democracy in the Nigeria Public Service: An x-ray of the political undercurrent

2020 ◽  
Vol 19 ◽  
pp. 75-78
Author(s):  
Eghoikhunu Stella Ughulu ◽  
Eunice Ijeaku Nwokike
Keyword(s):  
Data Collection ◽  
Federal Government ◽  
Public Service ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
The Political ◽  
Industrial Democracy ◽  
X Ray ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Masses ◽  
Secondary Method

The Federal Government of Nigeria in 2005 amended some sections of the Trade Union Act referred to as “The Principal Act” 1996 to form the new Trade Union (Amendment) Act 2005. The main objective of the new Act was the entrenchment of democracy in Nigeria public service by giving workers the freedom to choose which union to belong and opportunity to form more central union organizations, thereby encouraging industrial democracy. It is on this note that this study examined the political underlying motive in enacting the new Act in relation to industrial democracy in Nigeria Public Service, the weaknesses and strength of the Act were examined. The study relied on the secondary method of data collection. The study concluded that the enactment of the Trade Union (Amendment) Act 2005 was politically motivated to give the government the much-needed space to implement certain policies and decisions that are comfortable for the government. The study then recommended that the governmentshould embark on nation-wide consultation with stakeholders to develop valid amendments in Trade Union Acts for the betterment of all and not for the exploitation of the masses. Keywords: Trade Union Amendment Act, industrial democracy and Public service.

scholarly journals POLITICAL and LEGAL ACTIVITY of DEPUTIES of the NORTH CAUCASUS IN the STATE DUMA of the RUSSIAN EMPIRE in the EARLY twentieth Century

2020 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 14-18
Author(s):  
M.M. Aybatov ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Political System ◽  
Central Government ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Elite ◽  
The Political ◽  
North Caucasus ◽  
Caucasus Region ◽  
The North ◽  
Russian State ◽  
The Government

The article analyzes the political and legal activity of the deputies of the North Caucasus in the early XX century, during the formation and activity of the State Duma. It is noted that the tsarist administration, modernizing the state-political system of the country, could not ignore the multinational and multi-confessional nature of the Russian state and therefore tried to take into account these features of the Russian state-political system. The article concludes that the involvement of regional MPs in political and legal activities of the first legislature (State Duma) at the beginning of the XX century has allowed to bring to the attention of Central government authorities, the main problems of the North Caucasus region and provides a process for the integration of national and regional elites in the Russian political elite to pinpoint the positions of North Caucasian elites in the political space of the Russian state. But many legislative initiatives put forward by the deputies of the North Caucasus did not find support from the government authorities and their decisions were ostponed indefinitely

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