From the efficiency of the part to the effectiveness of the whole: The new shortcut for the Public Reform in Africa

When we look at the history of the Public Policy concepts, and more specifically at those related to reform, it seems that the policymakers are always using old wine in new bottles. From the seventies to now we moved from the public service reform to the civil service reform, through the public administration reform, the institutional development and more recently the excellent governance. All these concepts are relatively similar even if their scope can change according to the context, the country or the financial or development institution supporting the process. They all refer to strengthening the management of the public sector by improving the efficiency, the organization, the decision-making processes, the management of staff, the accountability, the design of public programmes and the delivery of public services (O’Neil 2007).

The objectives of these reforms haven’t changed since the industrialization age. During the last 40 years the world is reforming the Public Administration looking only at the agency result; focused on the structure, more or less centralization, more or fewer agencies how can be more efficient, increase productivity, but no one asked how these results can improve the performance of the society. They stay focused on the internal organization of the agencies, offices or Ministries of the governments without analyzing the link between Government, People, and Society. This link is always changing, and the policies are not improving as fast as this dynamic link, but we know effective public administration management must take into account changes reframing the relationship between Government, Society, and People.

Most of the African countries are implementing some costly, complex, ineffective reforms copied from what has been done in some countries in Europe such as in the UK. Two concerns can be raised from that:

?   Even in the UK, most of the reforms were unclear, with imprecise objectives, no cost associated, no timeline and no baseline data to measure the result of the impact (Pollitt, 2012).

?   The model of Public administration inspired by the industrial age will not be sufficient to prepare Government, people or society for the new and future challenges (Bourgon, 2011)

In the nineteenth, most of the countries went through public reforms but none of these reforms predicted the general use of the Internet, in early 2000 a new set of reforms (taking into account the widespread use of the internet) are implemented, but they missed to predict the rise of the social media and networks. Many things have changed in the world, and these things have redesigned the needs and the linkages between government and people.

The governments are facing today an increasing number of complex issues, which cannot be addressed separately (Political pressure, International relations, Financial or economic crisis, security…) in one hand, and in the other hand the Governments still the first public servant in countries where virtual communities are transforming the public policy issues and the related context. The modern information and communication technology change our world but also transform the relationship between providers and beneficiaries of the public services. This new relationship contributes to the complexity by increasing the density of connections between people. The government cannot prepare itself for the challenges of the 21st century using the tools of the 20th century as there is a significant disconnect between the complexity of the issues we are facing, the people’s expectations and what the governments can do.

The future of the public service in Africa will be in his capacity to anticipate emerging trends and emerging issues. The traditional approaches living governments in a reactive position, reacting in a crisis mode, where the cost is the highest and the risk on the vulnerable is as well the most elevated, will no longer work. It will erode trust in governments, and it will undermine confidence on the public institutions. While the first is not a public policy issue, declining trust in the capability of the institution to serve the collective interest will create instability and lead to more uncertainty and more complexity.

To take the shortcut of public reforms, the African Countries must see the role of the public administration as achieving results of every increasing public value at a lower overall cost for society and doing it in a manner to build the collective capacity to achieve better results over time (Bourgon, 2011). This new definition is a shift of focus from agency result to system widen society results. There is an emergent need to shift from the efficiency of the part to the effectiveness of the whole. Value is not created when we are just solving a problem in one system by transferring it to another (i.e., insolvency vs. debt; costs of the actions we are making today are at the expenses and the capacity of the future generations to shape their future).

In 2009, close to 200 participants from academia and the world of public sector practice shared ideas about how to prepare government for the challenges of the 21st century. The New Synthesis Project was born to support public sector practitioners who "are called upon to serve the public good and the collective interest, in the face of increasing complexity, uncertainty, and volatility. The New Synthesis Framework presents public administration as a dynamic system with the capacity to adapt to changing circumstances and to co-evolve with society." The framework would require:

?   An emergency function to anticipate what might be, with the ability to take proactive action and co-create collective responses to complex policy issues;

?   An effective compliance function to set priorities, help forge societal and political consensus and conserve energy within a context of constrained actions and behaviors;

?   An effective performance function to think across systems and work across boundaries, sectors, and disciplines;

?   A powerful resilience function to co-produce public results, encourage the active participation of citizens, families, communities as value creators, and to build the adaptive capacity of society to prosper and adapt in all circumstances.

The Commonwealth has developed nine fundamental principles of public sector reforms and even if all the nine keys principles highlighted cannot be considered aligned with the synthesis framework we can find a lot of similarities in the concepts but also in the project and initiatives developed in most of the countries. Ghana launched a new Strategy (2018-2023) with the aims “to develop a comprehensive national public sector reform which was responsive to the needs of business, the private sector, and the citizenry.” The strategy is primarily driven by the commonwealth key principles and has relevant indicators and timeframe. According to researches West Africa or more specifically the African Francophone zone is left behind in the term the implementation of effective public sector reforms.

The government, People, and Society cannot be separated, and the modern public administration policy is conceptualizing this linkage. As the context is changing, new issues are raising, new trends appearing, a new way of doing things is becoming mandatory. The old processes will only lead to old solutions. This framework is an opportunity to modernize public administration and to rethink the public delivery putting the people at the center.

In the next publications, I will go through some real case studies of public reforms initiatives implemented in some countries in Africa and Asia. Even if all of them cannot be considered a success and good practices they will provide for our analysis some lessons learned and essential tools for our next reforms.