The state of training in public policy management in Ghana

This paper discusses the relevance and state of training in public policy management in Ghana. The author argues that the lack of an institutional base for policy analysis is evident in the abdication and paralysis of policy-making, as well as the inability of the management development institutions to institutionalize training programmes in public policy management. Recognizing politicians and bureaucrats as complementary actors in the policy process, it is argued that organizing training programmes for them could contribute to improved policy-making. The content, methodology, duration, target group and impact of current training programmes in public policy management are analysed. Although the dearth of relevant local reading material on policy issue is identified as a problem in the teaching of public policy in Ghana, reference is made to some available publications on local public policy issues which could supplement Western-biased reading materials. Other problems discussed are the heterogeneous background of course participants and the non-involvement of faculty members in policy making. The paper concludes with recommendations on policy preview workshops; seminars for politicians and senior bureaucrats; development of policy analysts; and complementarity among the local management development institutions.     

Public administration schools and institutes had better enhance information literacy training for senior public servants

Senior public servants are leading forces of national economic development, social progress and national revival, as well as the organizers and decision makers of informatization construction. Public administration schools and institutes had better enhance information literacy education for public servants, in particular, the training of information consciousness and information competency of senior public servants should be emphasized.     

Expectancy theory in developing nations: Motivating Botswana public servants

The degree to which individuals are motivated to apply themselves depends in part on how far they expect to be able to achieve given goals. This study, based on interviews of local government administrators in Botswana, not only stresses the importance of expectancy in motivation but reports the importance of altruistic goals among these administrators. Among those interviewed there was a strong desire to advance their own careers, both by developing themselves in the job they currently hold, and by advancing through the organizational hierarchy. Employees, however, were also anxious to accomplish concrete objectives in their current jobs and thus to contribute to the development of the nation. Here unless officials have the expectancy of being able to achieve these goals their motivation is affected. Thus emphasis is placed in this article on the need to supplement traditional attention to pay and promotion as devices to improve motivation with a concern to remove road blocks to development. The enquiry thus strengthens the case for the performance improvement programme of the United Nations.     

Education and training for new public management

This article argues for a new approach to educate and train public managers. Several functional requirements regarding knowledge, skills and attitudes are discussed. The status and trends of public management education and training in several countries are reviewed. Situation and recent developments of public management education in Germany are subject of an exemplary case study. Elements of an effective curriculum with an international perspective and steps towards a common understanding of public management education are suggested.     

E‐government and public service quality in Ghana

This article contributes to the growing discourse on the potential of e‐government to transform the operations of public sector institutions, thereby improving public services. It does so by conceptualizing public service quality into efficiency, economy (cost reduction), customer satisfaction, and service accessibility and draws on qualitative data from the Ghanaian narrative for illustration. As previous studies have demonstrated, this study also affirms the potential of e‐government in improving public services delivery by increasing efficiency, reducing the cost of operations, expanding access to services, and achieving customer satisfaction. Yet, there remains a repertoire of challenges such as weak ICT infrastructure especially in towns and villages, incessant power outages and illiteracy, which are drawbacks to fully harnessing the benefits of e‐government in Ghana. The study recommends that these challenges should feature prominently in e‐government policies to increase the chances of solving them.     

Aspects of change in the Canadian federal public service

This article is divided into two parts. The first part looks at some significant changes that have taken place in Canada's federal public service over the last two or three years. These changes include the introduction of new management techniques, new organizational structures and new approaches to governance. The second part deals with my own organization, Consulting and Audit Canada, including the rationale for our existence, the kind of work we do and the issues we face. Both parts raise issues that are pertinent to the subject of public sector versus private sector, in the context of service delivery. (© 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.)     

A signal failure: Sports grants,public servants,and traffic lights

The Auditor General's performance audit into the failings of the Community Sport Infrastructure Grant Program has led to a ministerial resignation and a parliamentary inquiry. The media melee prompted by the ‘sports rorts’ affair has focussed on political corruption of process, with a concentration on the role of ministerial advisers. This is only part of the story. This article argues that on this occasion the Australian Public Service (APS) did not acquit itself well, and that the affair was triggered by an administrative failure to advise on threshold legal and procedural issues: what is termed the ‘traffic light’ role of a professional public service. The article considers how such policy advice failings may have occurred, and whether APS performance in this instance is an indicator of declining institutional capacity.     

Revitalizing public management training in the Americas

The decade of the 1980s signalled major changes within public administration and development-oriented activities. As a consequence of the internationalization of the agendas of practitioners and academics working in these areas, there is today a growing convergence among public policy, public management, public administration and political science. Given the complexity of the public sector cross-nationally, what has become necessary in public management education is the design of programmes that meet specific needs and priorities and which are responsive to very different national settings. This particular case study is centred around one endeavour to achieve more effective interfacing between theory and practice, in the teaching of public management and the design of development programmes in the United States (US). It is based on an assessment of a 10-year co-operative endeavour between the National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration and the US Agency for International Development. The outcomes of this project provided not only leverage for important changes in the teaching programmes of schools concerned with international management education but also built a new relationship between government and a non-governmental organization through the contacting out of management development work.     

New rôles of government in supporting manufacturing: the capabilities of support agencies in Ghana and Zimbabwe

This study examines the roles and capabilities of executive agencies in providing support services to manufacturing in Ghana and Zimbabwe. It asserts that the new roles of government during and after adjustment have not been clearly defined and are in fact more complex than running state‐owned productive enterprises. The basic shift is said to be from direct provision of goods and services to the provision of an enabling environment through support in areas such as training, information, finance, export and investment promotion and technology. Economic development is stimulated when there is a harmonious relationship between entrepreneurs and their institutional environment, much of which is provided by the state. This article concentrates upon the role of meso‐level agencies in changing incentives faced by entrepreneurs and shifting them out of unproductive activity and into productive entrepreneurship, and outlines some of the preliminary results from related research. There are several factors which influence the capabilities of agencies providing these services. Essentially they may be divided into internal and external factors. This allows the analysis to consider not only budgeting and incentive systems but also the impact of external pressures experienced by any given agency. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Closing the Massachusetts public training schools

One successful effort at policy termination—the closing of the Massachusetts public training schools—is examined. The analysis includes: how the tactics of survival which maintain most governmental organizations and most public policies were neutralized; how the barriers to implementation of the termination policy were overcome; how the new replacement policy—the privately operated, community-based, group-homes policy—was consolidated; and a preliminary evaluation of the termination tactics and the new policy.I am most grateful to all the people who were willing to be interviewed for this study. Many current and former employees of the Department of Youth Services and many observers inside and outside of the Massachusetts state government were very generous with their time. All quotations in this paper for which no reference is given come from these interviews. A longer, more detailed version of this study has been published as a Working Paper by the Institute of Policy Sciences and Public Affairs, Duke University.     

Of change,training and public affairs in Europe

European public affairs practitioners need to be increasingly professional in their reactions to an EU undergoing transformational change. The paper offers a comprehensive summary of the subtleties of institutional change in Commission, Parliament and Council in 2004. In particular, the author argues that expansion from 15 member states to 25 has fundamentally changed the nature of the Union's politics and the skills required to influence it. This new EU requires more of practitioners than experience and amateur instinct: to achieve results and avoid restrictive regulation, the public affairs community must adopt effective training strategies, challenging competence targets and regular self‐assessment of its performance and ethics. Copyright © 2004 Henry Stewart Publications     

The U.K. overseas development administration and non-departmental public bodies in the field of educational aid

The educational aid programme sponsored by the U.K. Overseas Development Administration has been conducted using organizations in which substantial changes have been made in the last ten years. This article analyses the changes in the structure of non-departmental agencies and in the relations between the Overseas Development Administration and the agencies, and considers the rationale for these. It draws attention to the contrast between the formal independence of these non-departmental bodies and continuing departmental control, and to the limitations of non-departmental bodies as a means of securing advice and co-operation. The article points to the difficulties in organizational terms of marrying the aim of providing a framework for co-operating with the recipients of aid, and for securing advice, co-operation and support in its administration from bodies outside central government in the U.K., while preserving ministerial responsibility.     

移民大潮中菲佣所体现的自身形象

随着国际移民大潮的发展,菲律宾海外劳务输出成为国际移民的一道亮丽风景线。与其他国家所发生的国际移民现象不同的是,在菲律宾对外输出的劳工的大军中,女佣占据了重要位置。菲律宾也因此有了"女仆国家"的称呼。菲佣大量出国就业始于20世纪70年代,而随着时代发展,"菲佣"成了菲律宾国家的标志之一,她们勤劳能干,为国家的发展贡献了自己的青春,展现出了一种属于自己的温柔、勤劳的形象。     

Conducting the elections in Zimbabwe 1980

The Zimbabwe elections in 1980 presented unusual administrative difficulties. They were conducted in some haste, during a cease fire in the civil war, and when stable administration was not established over the whole country. Further, the political settlement and re-establishment of an internationally recognized government hinged on popular and international acceptance of the elections as having been fairly conducted. The problems faced in the administration of the elections went beyond what are discussed in standard works on elections and the article describes what the main problems were in conducting the elections and facilitating effective supervision of them.     

Trends in training public managers: A report on a commonwealth seminar

This article reports on a conference on issues and trends in training practicing public managers. Some trends identified include: greater competition between civil service colleges and outside providers of training; university programs that compete in this market being based in business schools or autonomous units, rather than in traditional political science departments; a convergence among training providers on the use of adult education methodology; elite training programs now playing a larger role in training the entire public service; and some civil service training institutes simultaneously identifying more closely with strategic government priorities and developing a research role comparable to the university.     

The impact of interest rate on the demand for credit in Ghana

This article investigates the impact of financial liberalization on the demand for credit in Ghana. It contributes by making suggestions pertaining to questions on the effectiveness of interest rate liberalization in driving private sector demand for credit both in the short and the long‐run, as well as the speed of adjustments to equilibrium after the implementation of the financial liberalization programme. The study results indicate that interest rate has no significant impact on the demand for credit both in the short‐run and long‐run. Moreover, inflation has a negative significant effect on the demand for credit in the short‐run. The results also suggest that about 66% of disequilibrium from the preceding year is corrected in the current year. However, these findings seem to indicates that the financial market in Ghana is not fully competitive. The oligopolistic and noncompetitive financial system may be attributable to the extreme minimum capital requirement and the emerging consolidation of commercial banks through government takeovers as well as the various credit rationing practices by banks aimed at reducing the risk of adverse selection and insolvency.