Civil Service Reform and the World Bank

Abstract

Some argue that the complexity and uncerainty of civil savice refonn place the field outside .he Bank's comparative advantage. But a retreat from civil service management reform is tantamount to denying the crucial importance of government adminisu'ative capacity to implement economic and social programs. A more realistic approach is to ty to learn, through tir and error, how to make such programs work better. The Pa.b'. R.u-EaiAni Affasaan duvu_ PRE Wagi P,pL to *&vwmhUw dni_n a _ d Po _-_ ewd do 8 o f uG o U aN urn ,a pmumsn_ papm cam Of 0r a dirn MMM .iin. aW n aN.M b Ua ad A WGI,. Thm rEN._ Msrnin. A = , thu _m_*>> _ T%p dm _m b_m to d Wm d amL _ u lmNd4 OuW un W = W

International demands for austerity: Examining the impact of the IMF on the public sector

“…The election of Ronald Reagan in the United States and Margaret Thatcher in the United Kingdom, and the emergence of the BWashington Consensus^in international financial institutions, provided the political and institutional muscle for ideas about the optimal size of the public sector to influence policy design. Policymakers soon began to identify the size of the public sector as a problem that needed to be addressed (Biersteker 1990;Nunberg and Nellis 1992;Stevenson 1992;Goldsmith 1999;Lee and Strang 2006). 3 The fiscal crises that beset many developing countries in the 1980s gave advocates of public sector downsizing increased leverage to advocate for these changes (Biersteker 1990).…”

“…3 The fiscal crises that beset many developing countries in the 1980s gave advocates of public sector downsizing increased leverage to advocate for these changes (Biersteker 1990). Shrinking Bbloated bureaucracies^and pruning spending on public sector compensation became the means through which countries would put their fiscal houses in order and their economies on the right path (Nunberg and Nellis 1992;Rama 1999;Rodrik 2000).…”

“…The fiscal burden of public sector wage bills caused particular concern (Nunberg and Nellis 1992;Stevenson 1992). The wage bill is usually the single largest item of government expenditure and comprises almost 30% of government budgets in lower income countries (Das 1998, 16;Forni and Novta 2014).…”

Cleaning up and invigorating the civil service

“…Even more dramatic numbers emerge from Africa and some of the former communist countries. In 1983 real wage rates for`highly skilled' members of the civil service were 11 per cent of what they were in the mid-1970s in Ghana, 5 per cent in Uganda, 30 per cent in Nigeria, and 45 per cent in Zambia (Nunberg and Nellis, 1989). Another study found that in 1985 the base civil service salary rate at the`highest grade' was 4 per cent of what it was in 1975 in Somalia, 16 per cent in Sierra Leone, 19 per cent in Tanzania, and 22 per cent in Nigeria (Robinson, 1990).…”

“…Nunberg and Nellis (1995) reviewed many of the 90 World Bank lending operations from 1981 and 1991 in which civil service reform was a`prominent feature'.`The record suggests that reforms to date have been insuf®ciently ambitious in scope to bring about the degree of change that is needed. Meaningful change is going to require more forceful reforms' (Nunberg and Nellis, 1995, p. 42).…”