Managing Development in a Global Context

Building Administrative Capacity for the Age of Rapid Globalization: A Modest Prescription for the Twenty‐First Century

“…Advanced countries constantly strive to develop in rural and urban life, in science and technology, and in education and other programs that help upgrade their capacity to manage their governance and administrative systems. In developing countries, similarly, various approaches and strategies must be employed to accelerate the “development” process by upgrading existing capacities and acquiring new ones in science and technology, human resources, and organizational leadership for “managing development” (Dwivedi, Khator, and Nef 2007), as well as enhancing “development governance” (Huque and Zafarullah 2006).…”

“…However, with the flow of international resources to less developed nations, there must also be institutional, policy, administrative, and organizational mechanisms to develop a culture of anticorruption, free from external political or ideological manipulations, and a culture of professionalism in public service and administration in building capacity for sustainable development (UNDP 2002) with good global monitoring systems (Dwivedi, Khator, and Nef 2007). Transparency, accountability, and ethical standards must guide policy and administrative actions.…”

“…These key administrative capacities include the following: (1) structural capacity, such as centralization, decentralization, and other forms of structural arrangements (Galbraith and Lawler et al 1993); (2) process capacity that includes not only efficiency and effectiveness, but also qualities of “mutual causality” and self‐regulative organizational behaviors (Senge 2006); (3) cultural or normative capacity (Paquet 1999; Schein 1992); (4) institutional and organizational capacities noted earlier (Scott 2001); (5) learning leadership and managerial capacities with a “double‐loop, perpetual learning” capability (Argyris 2004; Schein 1992); (6) strategic human resources capacity (Farazmand 2007b); (7) financial resources capacity; (8) cognitive capacity, especially through “holistic learning” (Nonaka and Takeuchi 1995), for knowledge creation and the supply of lifeblood to other capacity areas of governance and administration (Drucker 2001; Kaneko 1995); (9) technological capacity of the electronic information age, such as the Internet, information systems; (10) ethical, accountability, and “legal/constitutional” as well as other capacities of democratic representation, responsiveness, and fairness (Cooper 1998; Waldo 1992); and (11) developmental capacity in both development administration and administrative development (Dwivedi, Khator, and Nef 2007; Haque and Zafarullah 2006; UN 2005, 2007).…”

Performance Management and Culture

“…However, it is now evident that attempts to detach employees from their culture often leave them rather alienated in ways that complicate how they are able to imbibe the so-called new cultures needed to aid their performance in organizations. Some national and organizational-level studies have argued that there are visible signs of "ethical breakdown" (Dwivedi et al 2007) which have had deleterious consequences on organizational performance. Findings from studies funded by international organizations such as the IMF and the World Bank have revealed prevalent cases of corruption, bribery, moonlighting, and other cases of ethical misconduct in the public sector especially.…”

From Bureaucracy to Debureaucratization?

“…In contrast to the past, more technocratic reforms of the 1950s and 1960s, the more recent attempts to revamp and to revitalize the administrative system have been driven, in most cases, by ideological forces (Dwivedi et al 2007;Argyriades 2007). Though springing from the government, they seek to stem its growth and to reduce its role as a political goal.…”