Civil Service Reform Guide: Fiscal Accountability and Sustainable Trade
Source: USAID | Year: 2023
The civil service is not only essential for a government to function but also plays a key role in supporting or undermining a government’s ability to deliver public services. It supports the very purpose of a government’s existence and forms a key part of the overall governance system. A well-functioning civil service assists in ensuring sound policymaking, supports efficient and effective service delivery, reduces administrative corruption, and strengthens government accountability in utilizing public resources.
In the face of changing environments, the civil service sometimes fails to achieve its intended objectives. This could be due to a variety of reasons, including an unskilled workforce, poor management, a lack of financial sustainability, poor administrative processes, a lack of modern tools, inconsistent processes for promotions, a lack of incentives, inadequate recruitment processes, or structural problems.
Reforming the civil service consists of “deliberate efforts to make government more organized, affordable, honest, responsive, or representative; to bring it closer to the grassroots; or to get it to perform and deliver better.”1 Civil service reform, like most reforms, requires a systematic approach that tackles inefficiencies at all levels (i.e., structure, capacity and skills, sustainability, performance, administrative processes, etc.).
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