The politics of government reform in Korea : from tripartite to bipartite politicization

Government reforms in South Korea, beginning in the 1980s, moved toward deconcentration and deregulation in the 1990s and 2000s. However, the contents of the reforms under the “transformational” presidencies following democratization, which aimed to raise the quality of government and respond to increasing social polarization and political discord, did not significantly reduce state power or depoliticize policy making. Instead, state strength was consolidated through tripartite politicization: the rise of ministers as a third force in policy making vis-à-vis the president and legislature. Under the “post-transformational” presidencies of Lee Myung-Bak and Park Geun-Hye, government reforms can be summarized as bipartite politicization between the president and legislature, as ministerial power has been reduced

도미니카 공화국 공공 기관의 성과 향상을 위한 핵심 요인 연구

학위논문(석사) -- 서울대학교대학원 : 행정대학원 글로벌행정전공, 2021.8. 이수영.This study was conducted as comparative cases to analyze the effect of the priority of the policy managed by three ministries in the Dominican Republic, their compliance with the regulation for the public administration, and the results of working with the national monitoring systems and performance evaluation framework for the consolidation of the result-based management at the ministerial level in the Caribbean country. The cases of the Ministry of Economy, Planning, and Development (MEPYD), the Ministry of Agriculture (MA), and the Ministry of Education (MINERD) were analyzed with a logic model and compared to identify the key factors to improve institutional performance, as they were, correspondingly: the ministry with the highest score, the ministry of the more remarkable improvement and the ministry with the lowest score in 2019, among the institutions that went through the Institutional Performance Evaluation System managed by the Ministry of Public Administration. Despite the Dominican Republic assigning a heavier weight to compliance to regulation in the institutional performance evaluation system, it is not as a powerful factor to drive organizational effectiveness as the right integration of goals and stakeholders’ interests, and identifying useful indicators to control management on time.이번 연구는 카리브해 국가의 장관급에서의 결과 기반 관리의 통합을 위하여 도미니카공화국 3개 부처가 관리하는 정책의 우선순위 효과, 공공행정 규정 준수 여부, 국가 감시체계 및 성과평가 구조와의 업무 결과 등을 분석하는 사례 비교를 수행하였다. 경제기획개발부(MEPYD), 농림부(MA), 교육부(MINERD)의 사례를 논리모델로 분석하고 기관 성과 향상의 핵심요인을 파악하여 비교한 결과, 각각 행정자치부가 관리하는 기관성과평가제를 거친 기관 중 가장 높은 점수를 받은 부처, 더욱 향상된 부처, 2019년 최저 점수를 받은 부처에 상응하였다. 도미니카 공화국이 기관성과평가제에서의 규제 준수에 무게를 두고 있음에도 불구하고 목표와 이해관계자의 이익의 올바른 통합으로서 조직적 효과를 견인하고 경영을 제때 통제할 수 있는 유용한 지표를 식별하는 것은 강력한 요인으로 작용하지 않는다.Chapter 1. Introduction to the Study 1 1.1. Context 1 1.2. Description of the Problem 2 1.3. Purpose, Research Questions, and Hypothesis 4 Chapter 2: Literature Review 6 2.1. Theoretical Framework 6 2.1.1. New Public Management (NPM), Results-Based Public Sector Management and its Monitoring & Evaluation Feature 6 2.2. Previous Studies on Performance Evaluation Systems for Public Organizations 8 2.3. Tools for supporting results-based management in the Dom. Rep. 13 2.3.1. Institutional Performance Evaluation System 13 2.3.2. Monitoring tools and the agencies managing them 19 2.4. Preliminary Findings 22 Chapter 3: Methodological Framework 25 3.1. Subjects 25 3.2. Variables 25 3.3. Data Collection and Analysis 26 3.3.1. IV1. The National Priority of the Sector 26 3.3.2. IV2. Personnel Management Capacity 28 3.3.3. IV3. Results-based Management Capacity 29 Chapter 4: Comparative Case Studies 35 4.1. IV1. National Priority Sector 35 4.2. IV2. Personnel Management Capacity 38 4.3. IV3. Results-based Management Capacity 39 Chapter 5: Conclusions and Recommendations 45 5.1. Conclusions 45 5.2. Recommendations 47 References 50 Abstract in Korean 61 Acknowledgments 62석

What Choices Do Democracies Have in Globalizing Economies? Technochratic Policy Making and Democratization

This document is part of a digital collection provided by the Martin P. Catherwood Library, ILR School, Cornell University, pertaining to the effects of globalization on the workplace worldwide. Special emphasis is placed on labor rights, working conditions, labor market changes, and union organizing.UNRISD_DemocraciesGlobalizingEconomies.pdf: 39 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

Development Management as Toolkit on Global Competitiveness in East Asia: the Cases of Japan, South Korea and Taiwan

This article reviews the role of development management on global competitiveness in Japan, Korea, and Taiwan. Development management has emerged in response to improvement in public service delivery, public institution building, and human resource development in the service of the internationally accepted development goals, as the stated by the United Nations Division for Public Administration and Development Management. However, most papers employing this approach seem to stay in the theoretical discussions, and rarely apply empirical evidence to specific projects, programs, or areas.Employing the competitiveness index developed by World Economic Forum (WEF) and the International Institute for Management Development (IMD), this research connects the toolkit approach to competitiveness in Japan, Korea, and Taiwan. This research finds that all of these countries have adopted a series of toolkit strategies to promote their global competitiveness. These toolkits can maintain consistent growth. In terms of theory and practice, this research employs cases-comparison strategies to reveal the theoretical components of development management, and thus advance the knowledge in this field

Independent regulatory agencies in emerging economies

While the diffusion of independent regulatory agencies (IRAs) across economically advanced countries has attracted much scholarly attention in recent years, systematic work on their spread across developing countries is still scarce. In an effort to address this gap in literature, this paper aims to analyze the diffusion of regulatory agencies in emerging economies in Latin America, Asia, and Central and Eastern Europe. At this early stage of our research, we aim to emprically map out regulatory agencies in economic regulation sectors (e.g. competition, finance, and utilities/infrastructure) enjoying some degree of autonomy or independence in emerging economies, rather than limiting our focus solely on those that meet all the criteria for independence in the strictest definition of the term. Such exploratory analysis constitutes the first step towards studying processes of diffusion in general and the mechanisms that lead to the creation of regulatory agencies in these economies in particular. The second objective of this paper is to examine the mechanisms which we expect to be at work in the spread of IRAs in the selected emerging economies. We argue that despite the creation of a number of agencies in the countries concerned before 1990, diffusion has become evident and “interdependent”, as opposed to spurious in the 1990s.independent regulatory agencies; emerging economies

The Institutional Dimension of e-Government Promotion: A Comparative Study on Making ‘Business Reference Model (BRM)’ in the U.S. and Korea

Why do e-government initiatives which are commonly implemented to achieve similar policy goals produce different outcomes in different nations? To answer this question, this paper examines e-government policy structure, which has been regarded as one of the most important institutional arrangements for e-government promotion (European Commission, 2007; Park, 2006; OECD, 2005; Eifert and Puschel, 2004). Specifically, the legal framework, the managerial tools for coordination and control, and the organizational arrangements of the e-government policy structures of the Bush administration in the U.S. and of Roh administration in Korea are compared. Based on such a comparative analysis, this study demonstrates how different institutional arrangements of e-government policy structure influence the different outcomes of BRMs in the two nations

The Federal Workforce: Characteristics and Trends

Understanding the characteristics and trends of the federal workforce is important because, among other things, agencies accomplish their missions via that workforce. Total personnel costs (direct compensation and benefits) for all federal employees (civilian and military, current employees and retirees) were estimated at more than $523 billion in 2008, and civilian personnel costs in the executive branch alone were estimated at about$194 billion. Three cabinet departments — the Departments of Defense (DOD), Veterans Affairs (DVA), and Homeland Security (DHS) — accounted for almost 60% of the nearly 1.9 million executive branch civilian employees in 2008. The duty stations for more than 35% of these employees were in four states (California, Virginia, Texas, and Maryland) and the District of Columbia, and DOD was the top federal employer in 35 states. DOD also employed more than 90% of federal civilian employees in foreign countries, and was the top federal employer in U.S. territories. The federal workforce grew by more than 120,000 employees between 2000 (the low point during the last 10 years) and 2008, with the growth concentrated in homeland security-related agencies and DVA. Civilian employment in other agencies (including DOD and most independent agencies) declined during the last 10 years. The number of blue-collar and clerical federal jobs declined between 1998 and 2008, but the number of professional and administrative jobs increased during this period. The percentage of the federal workforce that was made up of minorities also increased, but the percentage that was women remained almost constant. Although women and minorities represented an increasing portion of the growing professional and administrative groups, the representation of women and minorities in the Senior Executive Service was less than their presence in the overall workforce. The federal workforce was somewhat older in 2008 than it was in 1998, but the average length of service declined from 15.2 years in 1998 to 14.7 years in 2008. The number of white-collar employees in the General Schedule (GS) pay system declined during the last 10 years, while the number of employees in agency-specific pay systems (primarily at DOD and DHS) increased dramatically (from less than 1% of the workforce in 1998 to 16% in 2008). If these trends continue, the GS system will cover less than half of the federal civilian workforce by the year 2020. The average salary of the workforce was $69,061 in 2008, but average salaries varied substantially between and within federal agencies and pay systems. Although the federal workforce has grown somewhat in recent years, a 2006 study estimated that the “hidden” federal workforce of contractors and grantees grew by more than 50% between 1999 and 2005, when it reportedly included more than 10.5 million jobs in 2005. That figure is more than twice as large as the combined total of all three branches of government, the U.S. Postal Service, the intelligence agencies, the armed forces, and the Ready Reserve. This report will be updated when September 2008 data for the federal workforce become available

Managing the civil service : what LDCs can learn from developed country reforms

The author examines current civil service management (CSM) practices in advanced countries to provide guidance for developing country governments that face the dilemma of how to recruit, retain, and motivate appropriately skilled staff at affordable costs, given a limited human resource base. Advanced country administrations are following two distinct paths to improving CSM. Some countries, such as the United Kingdom, are engaged insweeping"managerialist"reforms to decentralize civil service functions and make them more responsive to the client public. By introducing complex financial reporting systems, managers have increased autonomy; some functions are spun off into semi-autonomous agencies operating on an increasingly commercial basis. By contrast, other industrialized countries, such as Singapore, have retained more traditional, largely centralized civil service structures, pursuing only incremental improvements in specific aspects of CSM. The author speculates about what is likely to work best in developing country administrations: Centralized civil service management models provide the best starting point for most developing countries because decentralized agency systems require technological and human resources beyond their capabilities. Some better-endowed countries could use certain agency-type features selectively. Such administrations could establish strategic plans to move toward a fuller agency system as their institutional capabilities increase. Developing countries face trade-offs in choosing which CSM functions should be strengthened first. Two functions - personnel establishment control and staff recruitment - are essential for civil service performance and should get top priority. Senior Executive Services have proved difficult to design and implement in advanced countries, but many flaws can be corrected in adapting them to developing countries, where there is often an urgent need to groom higher-level staff. Assuming minimal, essential levels of personnel establishment and budgetary control, unified pay and classification could be relaxed in developing countries, following the lead of increasing numbers of advanced countries that have done this. Given the urgency of other CSM tasks, lower priority should be assigned to reform involving performance pay, the benefits of which have yet to be demonstrated in the public sectors of developed countries. The management requirements and costs of installingperformance pay systems can be considerable and employee resistance may subvert such efforts. But performance-related promotion systems, even if imperfectly implemented, can help move developing country civil service values toward standards of competence and merit.National Governance,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Work&Working Conditions,Governance Indicators,Public Sector Economics&Finance