Reflections on New Public Management-Style Reform in the U.S. National Administration and Public Trust in Government

A concerted effort to introduce thoroughgoing reforms into U.S. national administration began in September 1993, when the Clinton-Gore administration issued the first report of the National Performance Review (NPR). The continuing reform effort, which is generally called “reinventing government” in the United States, shares many characteristics with the broader global New Public Management (NPM) movement and is often treated as part of it. The American NPM-style reform program was augmented by congressional attempts to make national agencies more performance-oriented. President George W. Bush, who took office in January 2001, continued to advance several NPM goals, though with some important differences. There is no parallel period of such fundamental, comprehensive, and concentrated administrative reform in American history. The reform agenda has been coherent and consistent enough to allow reflection on its efficacy in terms of its own objectives. These were: 1) making government work better and cost less and 2) building citizens' trust in it. We made two conclusions within this paper. First, the record of the NPM's achievement of greater cost-effectiveness is ambiguous, disputing the Clinton-Gore administration's central claims; the public as a whole perceives no reduction in the waste of its tax dollars. Second, the NPM fell far short of building significantly greater trust in government.

Clinton e a reinvenção do governo federal: o National Performance Review

O artigo analisa o National Performance Review (NPR), programa de reforma administrativa na gestão do presidente Clinton, implementado em 1993, e que traduz o novo paradigma empreendedorialista proposto para o funcionamento da burocracia do governo federal americano. Na primeira parte são apresentados os princípios, objetivos e natureza da agenda, ressaltando-se as suas bases conceituais. Segue-se uma análise sobre a formação da agenda e a seqüência da sua implementação. A 3 a parte compreende uma visão da dinâmica político-institucional, com destaque para as tensões observadas entre o Legislativo e o Executivo, e o impacto destas nas mudanças da agenda. Na última seção, apresenta-se um painel empírico sobre alguns dos resultados em determinadas agências e departamentos do Governo, pretendendo-se oferecer contribuições ao processo de reformas administrativas atualmente em curso no Brasil.

NASA and The National Performance Review

No abstract available.

Human Resource Assessment — The Link to Mission

The National Performance Review called for a refocusing and revitalizing of mechanisms to assess human resource program effectiveness by relating such effectiveness to mission accomplishment. The traditional Personnel Management Evaluation (PME) Program used by many federal organizations, which emphasized regulatory and statutory conformance, did not fit this new paradigm. The Defense Contract Audit Agency's Human Resource Assessment Model analyzes the degree of achievement in Strategic Plan goal attainment, and, in so doing, serves as a direct measure of Agency mission accomplishment.