The Question of Roles and Identities in Public Administration

The article argues that one needs to open up the question of what it means to be a civil servant today in order to understand the key characteristics of public administration in contemporary Western democracies. The role of the civil servant is characterised by a multitude of expectations deriving from old and new role demands that exist side by side. In this sense, the role is constituted of different archaeological layers. Which layers become the dominant ones are not given, but widely depend on the context within which the role is enacted and on the civil servant's individual role interpretation. The article presents the results of a case study carried out within three Danish government ministries on the role of the civil servant. It is shown how differently the role is interpreted in the Danish state administration depending on which of the archaeological layers are activated, and how these different interpretations all lead to role conflicts for the individual civil servant.