Improving public services, using State resources efficiently, and managing State agencies effectively have been ongoing concerns of Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) governments since the beginning of this century. Government officials are now paying closer attention to the results obtained by their administrations. Citizens are now demanding not only universality but also quality in the services that the State provides (e.g., education, healthcare, and legal services). To meet this growing demand for public sector effectiveness, governments have formulated new laws, created or modified institutions, and implemented innovative management methodologies and instruments.Based on data gathered in 24 countries, this book analyzes the current situation, the progress made, and the challenges still facing the governments of the region in their efforts to achieve more effective public administrations.

This report examines the influence of trust on policy making and explores some of the steps governments can take to strengthen public trust.

Nations around the world are facing various crises of ineffective government. Basic governmental functions—protecting rights, preventing violence, and promoting material well-being—are compromised, leading to declines in general welfare, in the enjoyment of rights, and even in democracy itself. This innovative collection, featuring analyses by leaders in the fields of constitutional law and politics, highlights the essential role of effective government in sustaining democratic constitutionalism. The book explores “effective government” as a right, principle, duty, and interest, situating questions of governance in debates about negative and positive constitutionalism. In addition to providing new conceptual approaches to the connections between rights and governance, the volume also provides novel insights into government institutions, including courts, legislatures, executives, and administrative bodies, as well as the media and political parties. This is an essential volume for anyone interested in constitutionalism, comparative law, governance, democracy, the rule of law, and rights.

An updated edition of the classic text on public administration presents practical steps for managing government effectively in an age of hyperpartisanship. Co-winner of the Louis Brownlow Book Award from the National Academy of Public Administration The traditional theory of public administration is based on entrenched notions of hierarchy and authority. However, as the structure of public work has grown less hierarchical, managers have adopted a wide variety of non-authoritarian strategies. This growing gap between theoretical ideas and actual practice poses enormous challenges for front-line leaders struggling to deal with ever-larger expectations and ever-tighter budgets—and for American government in determining how best to hold public administrators accountable for their performance. The Transformation of Governance offers a new framework for reconciling effective administration with the requirements of democratic government. Instead of thinking in terms of organizational structure and management, Donald F. Kettl suggests, administrators and theorists need to focus on governance, or the links between government and its broader environment—political, social, and administrative—through which social action occurs. In this updated edition, a new epilogue shows Kettl urging political leaders to step back from the political barricades of hyperpartisanship to consider government’s contemporary dilemma: Is there any practical way forward for public administrators to manage government effectively? Reinforcing the ten principles of bridge building which he developed in the original book, Kettl adds an eleventh, which lays out five transformative strategies: redefining public law to promote public accountability; re-conceptualizing government agencies as instruments of leverage; launching government leaders as boundary spanners; using information technology for building authority and trust; and incorporating performance management into processes that drive collaboration. With a new preface from Michael Nelson, editor of the Interpreting American Politics series, this award-winning book will be sought out by public policymakers eager to read a leading scholar's newest insights into the field.

A seminal work for the public sector, Quality Standards for Highly Effective Government (Second Edition) redefines what is expected and what is required for excellence in management. The practices presented here also benefit non-profit organizations, and indeed any organization in which services are not directly rewarded by a purchase transaction. The book introduces three new performance standards that frame the value add of management, for processes, systems, and aligned leadership objectives. Along with defining known best practices, these standards create an imperative for the use of Lean and continuous quality improvement as a foundation for good management, built onto that defined structure. These standards also create a means to recognize and reward those managers who build and regularly use this framework. Measurable quality standards are necessary for government, because there is no free market incentivizing government managers for efficiency, and there is no direct penalty for offices that provide poor service. The oversight of government is left to elected officials, who often only get generalized and high level feedback and then only on failure. Where there is failure, the usual response of leadership is to change leadership or to restructure offices. But these actions never get to the level of the workers on the ground, and cannot change whether they have or are currently using best practice modeling. Richard Mallory both defines and shows the logic behind the process management standard, the system management standard, and the aligned leadership objectives standard, and how these apply to front line managers, program and executive managers, and even to elected leaders. Because these standards are measurable and auditable, they can form the basis of an integrated scorecard for every government agency in the world, and a roadmap on how to obtain maximum value from each of them. The credibility of these standards is underwritten and proven through their adoption by the Government Division of the American Society for Quality, and international best practice standards for governments worldwide.

In this major new contribution to a rapidly expanding field, the authors offer an integrated analysis of the wave of management reforms which have swept through so many countries in the last twenty years. The reform trajectories of ten countries are compared, and key differences of approach discussed. Unlike some previous works, this volume affords balanced coverage to the 'New Public Management' (NPM) and the 'non-NPM' or 'reluctant NPM' countries, since it covers Australia, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, the UK and the USA. Unusually, it also includes a preliminary analysis of attempts to improve management within the European Commission.