All the analyses and trends in the last 20 years are directing to the fact that the essence of the public administration reform is in a change of conduct and a manner of work of civil servants, it is one of the main conclusions of the International Conference on Public Administration and Public Administration Reform, which has been held in London on 3rd and 4th December. All the administrations of the world, it has been pointed out by the participants of the conference, and those from undeveloped countries as well, are facing the problems of ineffectiveness, excessive expenditures, tardiness and corruption, and financial crisis, development of technology and higher expectations of citizens, are the factors which increase the pressure for a change in public administration.
"Prescribing of rules is not a guarantee of change of conduct in administration. It is needed to make a distance from the usual representation on what the state administration is, to start to think in a way that the work in public administration is not long-lasting and that the governments should re-orient themselves from the direct provider to a controller of services to citizens", thinks Tereza Kuristin, analyst in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Similar opinion also has Gas O'Donel, secretary in the Cabinet of the British Prime Minister, who has pointed out that the administration should also deal with the things as are popularization and subvention of usage of alternative sources of energy, public transportation or vehicles with reduced emission of damaging gases. In such case, O'Donel believes, administration would confirm that it is interested in everyday, practical problems and needs of citizens.
"Relation between the citizens and administration is such that the citizens ask from the state to satisfy their needs, and the state tends to change their needs", O'Donel has said, by concluding that this relation should be examined.
Among the newest trends in the efforts to make the administration around the world more efficient and opened, the following have been stated:
- Individualization of public administration, or an increase of number of civil servants, who work over contract and are being paid according to the results of their work
- Fostering of public-private partnership in providing the services
- Creating of concurrent, competitive climate among the sectors inside the institution.
Kus Rišel, from the General Directorate for Assistance of the European Commission, has been talking about the experiences of donors in providing of financial assistance for development of administrations. By repeating already settled thesis that the donors place their money by leading themselves by geopolitical interests of the governments of their countries, Rišel has said that "under neither conditions the assistance should be given to the country which did not ask for it or which did not clearly articulate what kind of assistance it needs".
At the conference there has also been talked about corruption in state administration, to which, according to analyses, goes 3% of the world’s gross social product per year. The index of perception for 2008, which has been calculated by the Transparency International, has shown that the smallest corruption is in Singapore, New Zeeland and Sweden, while the biggest is in the countries of sub-Sahara Africa and in conflicted countries of Asia. In respect to the fact that the corruption is a two-way process, some countries have predicted in their local laws some more strict penalties for a giver than for a receiver of bribe.
The conference has been organized by the Center for Parliamentary Studies from London, and among the participants from 22 countries of the world, was also the representative of the Public Administration Reform Coordinator’s Office in BiH.