THE CHALLENGES OF THE CIVIL SERVICE REFORM IN ETHIOPIA: INITIAL OBSERVATIONS

Paulos Chanie *

Abstract: Ethiopia, as part of its general political and economic restructuring program, is currently reforming its civil service. Using qualitative data, the study analyses the contents and processes of the civil service reform program. It emerges from the study that the reform measures have deficiencies in tackling the major problems confronting the Ethiopian civil service. This has been due, inter alia, to faulty diagnosis of the problems underlying the weaknesses of the civil service. It is also found that the reform measures lack the necessary preconditions to be adequately put into practice. The paper concludes by arguing that the reform measures must be contextualised and executed incrementally by identifying priority areas, while taking into consideration capacity to implement the measures proposed.

1. INTRODUCTION

The role of the civil service as an instrument in a country's socio-economic and political development is incontestable. In some parts of the world, however, the civil service seems unable to cope with the prevailing ideological, political and economic changes as well as management innovations. In other parts of the world, especially in Africa, the institutional and capacity weakness of the civil service is considered to be one of the major causes of social and political upheavals and economic crises. Cognisant of this fact, over the last two decades, many countries are introducing fundamental changes in the structure and operations of their civil services.

Ethiopia, as part of its general political and economic restructuring programs, is undertaking comprehensive measures to restructure its civil service. The aim of this study is to conduct a pre-implementation analysis of this on-going civil service reform. The study will analyse the contents of the reform measures and their relevance and feasibility in the Ethiopian environment. It will also make preliminary observations on the challenges and problems likely to be faced in the implementation of the reform.

The paper will first review the theoretical model that will be used to analyse the civil service reform program in Ethiopia - the `New Public Management'. Subsequently it will give a brief description of the inception and development of the civil service in the country. The civil service reform measures taken during the periods of Emperor Haile Sellassie, the Dergue and the EPRDF will be summarised. In the last part of the paper the on-going reform program will be analysed and some initial observations on the civil service reform measures taken by the current regime will be provided. In this part, the impact of the first phase of the reform measures (those taken before 1996) and a critical analysis of the contents and processes of the on-going second phase reform (from 1996 - present) will be analysed.

In writing this paper information is collected through discussions with different members of the civil service and with knowledgeable persons in the field. The writer's own observations and secondary sources - books, journals, and unpublished reports are extensively used.

2. THEORETICAL OVERVIEW

There are different models or strategies used for the reform of public management or public administration. Taking the classification of Verheijen (1998, 4-6), three models can be identified. These are: radical reform, incremental reform¹and moderate managerialism.² In the following paragraphs the radical reform, which is labelled as the `New Public Management (NPM)', will be discussed. This model will be used to analyse the on-going civil service reform program in Ethiopia.

The term `New Public Management' is used as shorthand for many of the new trends or reforms in public administration. The term is common in many European countries and is popularly employed to explain attempts to redefine administrative culture and structures in government. In USA, although the term NPM is not current, similar terms such as `reinventing government' and `post bureaucratic reform paradigm<sup>3</sup>' are often used (Massy 1997, 7). In many countries of the South, NPM, coined by some as `Governmental Approach to Civil Service Reform', is used to cover the administrative reform measures that are being undertaken, on the recommendation of the World Bank, IMF or other donors (Larbi 1999).

The literature marks `New Public Management' as a strong intellectual paradigm based on Public Choice theory<sup>4</sup> and Agency theory<sup>5</sup> and shows that it has different causes and elements. The first cause is considered to be the shortcomings of public sector administration and, hence, the need for a wholesale adoption of private sector values such as `risk-taking', `customer focus' and `bottom-line orientation' (Larson 1997, 131). Others have pointed out that the assumption behind NPM is that private management is superior to public management; therefore, private sector techniques should be `imported' into public administration (Shand 1996; Larbi 1999).

The second major impetus seems to be the need to overcome the inefficiency and ineffectiveness caused by traditional monolithic bureaucracies, the functionally organised agencies and the central planning approaches which predominated from the 1950s to the late 1970s (Kaul 1997). Massey (1997, 10), who argues that NPM is a reversal of the old bureaucratic model, states:

... NPM with its flattened hierarchies, reliance on contracts, individual initiatives and managerial techniques taken from private sector, is designed to annul the perceived inefficiencies and ineffectiveness of the old system with its concentration upon legal-rational rules, clear lines of accountability, objective implementation of policy and careful scrutiny of all policy options.

The third major cause for NPM revolves around the role of government. NPM proclaims that the preferred role of government should be changed from acting as the principal vehicle for socio-economic development to that of guiding and facilitating that development (Kaul 1997). It is also argued that government should move from a concern `to do' towards a concern `to ensure that things are done'. The managerial focus should also be directed away from `formal process' towards `results'. Thus, as pointed by Kaul (1997, 26):

The broad objectives of such reforms have been to shift emphasis of government from developing plans to developing key strategic areas, to shift emphasis from inward-looking systems to developing partnerships, to shift emphasis from inputs and processes to outputs and outcomes, and to shift emphasis towards managing diversity within a unified public service.

The fourth major impetus for NPM is the need to have a decentralised management. Here the major areas of emphasis are breaking up the huge public bureaucracies into more autonomous business units or executive agencies, and giving managers increased control over budgets for which they are accountable. It also involves `de-layering' of vertically integrated organisations (replacing traditional tall structures with flatter and more responsive structures); downsizing or rationalising and trimming the public sector in order to achieve `leaner' (small and compact) and `meaner' (cost-effective) public service; divorcing the provision from the production of public services; adopting new forms of corporate governance, and moving to a board of directors model in the public service (Larbi 1999).

Moreover, it could be argued that NPM has been pushed largely by a combination of economic crises and geo-political changes resulting in reduced financial resources for government. It is also pulled by a sense of new possibilities and the development of a new set of managerial strategies that promise to lever greater results from fewer resources. Generally, it could be said that the `New Public Management' is essentially a distinctive set of ideas about the purposes, organisations and operations of governments and their administrative agents (Warrington 1997, 10). But it has to be understood that NPM is not a new phenomenon.⁶ It is rather the culmination of the fundamental changes in the working of governments in the last two decades that have resulted in major and visible management innovations that are aimed at delivering greater efficiency, and more responsive and flexible public services.

The `New Public Management' constitutes a comprehensive set of elements that touches the whole area of governmental structures and activities. The following can be considered to be some of the main elements in the `New Public Management' model (Larbi 1999; Keraudren and Mierlo 1998; Coombes 1998, Warrington 1997; Kaul 1997; Larson 1997; Massey 1997; Dunleavy 1997; Shand 1996):

· redefining the relationship between political policy making and administrative policy implementation by distinguishing the roles and responsibilities of senior administrators from that of politicians;

· replacing the highly centralised hierarchical organisational structures with a decentralised management environment where decisions on resource allocation and service delivery are taken closer to the point of delivery;

· making public services more responsive to the needs of the people who use them and considering users of the services as active consumers;

· designing management structures for actual or potential competition among government owned and private sector providers of public services so as to provide pressure for efficiency and effectiveness;

· enabling managers within government to act as public sector entrepreneurs, fully utilising the value of capital, goods, and staff within government to deliver specified objectives;

· introducing a financial management and accounting system which has such components as output-oriented systems, accrual accounting, capital charging and budgeting based on outputs and outcomes;

· harnessing information technology to be used in areas such as revenue collection, financial management and accounting, interdepartmental communication systems, human resource management, delivering improved service to the public and the like;

· completely revising the traditional public service personnel management policies and instituting systems where: open recruitment procedures are emphasised; vacancies are filled on the basis of skills and competence; there is a shift from high security careers, shaped by length of service and seniority, towards short term employment contracts and achievement oriented promotion; incentive packages which ensure that skills and, in particular, personnel achievements are recognised and rewarded; performance review techniques that inform employees of the results expected of them in the performance of their work and that identify the strengths and weaknesses of individual contributions; personal career planning which ensures that personal ambitions and aspirations are harnessed towards the overall service of government; authority is explicitly delegated to senior officials in exchange for accountability for performance and monitoring is achieved through performance agreements, etc.

As can be seen from the above discussion, New Public Management shifts the emphasis from traditional public administration to public management. This is to say that the traditional model of organisation and delivery of public services, based on the principles of bureaucratic hierarchy, planning, centralisation and direct control is apparently being replaced by a market based public service management. NPM is considered to be a move towards checking the growth of government and the privatisation of public administration (Hood 1997) and shifting to an era of paperless bureaucracy and the provision of `one-stop non-stop' service to the public (Hood 1997). Moreover, NPM, as a reform measure, is being undertaken in many countries of the North and the South. The model, however, is not fool-proof and generates some difficulties in implementation. Some also have pointed out that in many countries the avowed objectives of the model are not being attained.⁷ Some of the theoretical justifications are also highly questionable.⁸

In this paper, it is this `New Public Management' model that is going to be used as a framework within which to analyse the contents and processes of the reform policy that is underway in Ethiopia. Like many of the countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, Ethiopia is also embracing elements of the New Public Management approach. This is evident from the Ethiopian civil service reform program, which is in line with the NPM concept. Because this model is based on current thinking on public sector reform which stipulates that the role and institutional character of the state and the public sector should be more market and private sector oriented, it is possible to use the model for the purpose of analysis. This thinking is also in the context of the International Monetary Fund/World Bank-supported structural adjustment programs (SAPs), which Ethiopia is currently following. Furthermore, it is widely recognised that NPM is the current popular model for the analysis of contemporary administrative reforms in both the developed and developing countries.

3. THE INCEPTION AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE ETHIOPIAN CIVIL SERVICE

The early years of the twentieth century witnessed the inception of modern public administration and the emergence of civil servants in Ethiopia. As of this period, the civil service has been serving the different regimes in power. The regimes (especially of Emperor Haile Sellassie and the EPRDF) have introduced major reform measures in the civil service. In the following paragraphs, an attempt will be made to outline the inception, development and status of the civil service and the reform measures considered under the different regimes in power.

3.1 Emperor Menilek and the Inception of the Civil Service

The inception of modern public administration goes back to the creation of modern Ethiopia during the last days of the reign of Emperor Menilek (1889-1913). Prior to this period, the country was under traditional administration⁹ and the different Ethiopian monarchs had failed to build any kind of administrative framework through which they could exercise their absolute power.

One major cause was the absence of centralised political leadership due to the incessant power struggle between the regional lords, principalities and kingdoms and the drive to expand their territory (see also other reasons in Perham 1969, 73-75; Abir 1968). As indicated by Asmelash (1972) the situation was "... all the time a hindrance to the establishment of centralised administration with the systematic archives recording the administration of the empire." It was during the Menilek years that the country was first divided into smaller administrative units and that gradual modernisation took place. The period saw the beginnings of modern government and a modern army; the establishment of the railway; the first motor cars and other new institutions and technological innovations. Addis Ababa was established as the capital of the government. Other measures were also taken by the Emperor to modernise Ethiopian public administration. One of the prominent measures was the creation of ministries. As Perham (1969, 89) indicated "The Emperor Menilek, keenly interested in the new world suddenly impinging upon his country and determined to modernise his administration upon European lines, began the creation of ministries". Perham states that in 1907-8 the ministries of justice, war, the interior, commerce and foreign affairs, finance and agriculture, and public works were created and in 1911 a ministry for posts and telegraphs was added and foreign affairs became a separate ministry (1969, 89). The ministries were housed in buildings set up within the palace enclosure.

As Asmelash (1972, 102) pointed out, during Menilek's time, the ministers were not salaried and appointment was based on loyalty and the number of followers that they could mobilise during wartime. The civil service was also small in number and was primarily engaged in maintaining law and order. Generally, however, the setting up of the ministries by Menilek was the beginning of a new era in the administrative development of the country and the inception of the civil service.

3.2 The Period of Haile Sellassie and the Civil Service

Emperor Haile Sellassie (Regent 1917-1930, Emperor 1930-1974) had the best claim of instituting modern public administration in Ethiopia, which was started by his predecessor. It was during his reign that the process of centralising and modernising the state reached a relatively advanced stage and the modernisation of the state was promoted.

The Emperor, during his early days in power, created further ministries for Industry, Education and Fine Arts, Justice, Public Works and Communications, with departments for Mines and Slavery (Perham 1969, 89-90). Unlike during the period of Menilek, the ministries were housed outside the palace precincts. From 1930-1935 many important attempts at reform were taken and these included: new measures for training the army, the inauguration of a parliament, the development of education, judicial reform, the engagement of foreign advisors and measures taken for the abolition of slavery (Perham 1969). Implementation of reforms was discontinued as a result of the Italian occupation of 1935 - 1941. But after its end and the Emperor's return to power, many reforms were carried out and the whole ministerial system was completely reorganised and greatly extended.¹⁰ The following are some of the administrative reforms (see also Perham 1969; Asmelash 1972):

· The Administrative Regulation Decree No. 1 of 1942. The decree ended the strong power and autonomy of the provincial governors. The decree instituted the appointment by the centre of governors-general, directors, governors, principal secretaries, meslänés, and police to each province. The governors-general and the officers were attached directly to Addis Ababa and received their salaries from the central treasury. The decree also brought about a deconcentrated form of administration, reflected by the fact that the governors-general were given power to exercise only general supervision over all officials appointed in their province by the ministries, and the officials were responsible only to their respective ministries.

· An Order to Define the Powers and Duties of the Ministries, No. 1 of 1943 and An Order to Amend the Ministers (Definition of Powers) Order, 1943, No.2 of 1943. Through these two orders the Council of Ministers was created. Twelve ministers were listed, their powers and relations were defined, and the Office of the Prime Minister was established. The Office of the Prime Minster was made head of all ministries and was responsible for the good administration of all the work in the ministries, harmonising their duties and transmitting the Emperor's orders (Perham 1969, 89). The ministers, among other duties and responsibilities, were charged with the duty of preparing draft laws - except those reserved for the Emperor. They were also empowered to appoint their staff and prepare their budget estimates.

· The revised constitution of 1955. This constitution made a clear distinction between posts of confidence and career posts. In Article 66, it states that the Emperor has the right to select, appoint, and dismiss the Prime Minister and all other ministers and vice-ministers. The appointment, promotion, transfer, suspension, retirement, dismissal and discipline of all other government officials and employees was to be governed by regulations made by the Council of Ministers, to be approved and proclaimed by the Emperor.

· The establishment of the Imperial Institute of Public Administration in 1952. As Asmelash (1972) pointed out this was a significant development for the administration of the country. The institute was established as a joint venture of the Ethiopian Government and the technical assistance program of the United Nations. Its objectives included training of civil servants, consultation and research (Asmalsh 1972).

· The establishment of the Central Personnel Agency by Order no. 23 of 1961 and amended by Order no. 28 of 1962.

· The enactment of basic regulations governing the civil service through the Public Service Regulation no. 1, 1962 and the Public Service Position Classification and Scale regulation no. 1, 1972.

It was at this juncture that the definition of a civil servant was provided. Accordingly, it was defined to mean employees of ministries, chartered government agencies and other public authorities. The definition excluded members of the armed and police forces; judges; public servants or other employees above the rank of assistant minister or its equivalent; members of both Houses of Parliament; employees who had been excluded from the coverage of the term `public servant' by the public service commissioners with the approval of the Council of Ministers; temporary, seasonal and contractual employees (Getachew 1997).

The creation of the Central Personnel Agency was a landmark in the proper formation of the civil service administration. The agency's primary objective was to maintain an efficient, effective and permanent civil service based on a merit system. The following are some of the tasks of the agency and other related administrative measures taken during the period (Asmelash 1972; Atkilt 1998):

· The agency was entrusted with the responsibility of establishing a homogeneous public service governed by uniform rules and principles.

· Recruitment of both classified and unclassified public servants was to be within the agency's jurisdiction.

· All appointments up to the rank of Assistant Minister were to be the agency's responsibility.

· There was to be open competitive examination in the selection of government employees.

· The grading and the salary structure were to be based on the position classification system.

· Merit as a criterion for appointment was introduced, replacing the old method which was based on favouritism or ascription.

· A pension scheme for public servants was instituted.

As could be gathered from the above discussion, with the coming to power of Emperor Haile Sellassie, the foundation of the modern bureaucracy was laid down. During the period, especially in the 1960s, the importance of an efficient administrative system was recognised. The civil service seemed to be accepted as the chief instrument available to governments for promoting economic and social development. Generally, it could be safely argued that the civil service contributed, in varying degrees, to the economic and social progress achieved at the time.

Nonetheless, there were problems. These were the absence of strong participation from the concerned organs especially in the preparation of the position classification, salary scale and job descriptions; and lack of skilled personnel to prepare a uniform and comprehensive policy. Moreover, the absence of strict adherence to the civil service rules and regulations, and political interference in administrative affairs were seen as chronic problems of the time.

3.3 The Period of the Dergue and the Civil Service

There was a revolutionary government in Ethiopia (1974-1991), popularly known as the Dergue. It was a highly centralised unitary government following a Soviet-inspired centralised economic planning and command economic system. During this period there were no fundamental reform measures promulgated to alter or modify the functioning and management of the civil service. Except for the introduction of a few reform measures, the civil service operated under the different orders and decrees issued during the reign of Haile Sellassie.

Among some of the civil service reform measures taken during the period of the Dergue, the expansion of the state apparatus and the restructuring of the cabinet could be mentioned. Some new ministries, commissions, agencies and authorities were created, others were merged or dissolved. Many were also renamed. A case in point is the Central Personnel Agency that was renamed the Public Service Commission. The Dergue also took some reform measures with regard to the salary scale of the civil service. The major ones were: the increase in the starting salary of the civil service from Br. 25 to Br. 50 (in 1975) and a shift in the ceiling from Br. 285 to Br. 636 for eligibility to periodic salary increment (in 1982).

During the period of the Dergue many problematic situations that crippled the civil servants were observed. Some of them were: the lack of trust, respect and confidence of the politicians as regards the career civil service personnel; absence of competitive merit-based recruitment and promotion practices at higher and middle level posts and, poor pay. These mal-practices in the civil service demoralised and demotivated a good number of them (Asmelash 1998, 24; Atkilt 1998, 75). Moreover as indicated in a related work (Paulos 1997), there was another peculiar constraint of the time:

During the Dergue regime the government ruled by edicts and decrees. There was a confusing pattern of political appointments. In most of the cases many of the higher, middle and even lower level posts in the different ministries and agencies were posts of confidence. There were two confusing structures - the political and the functional. All the decisions in the civil service institutions were made through the political structures by political cadres. There was virtually no place for apolitical professionals. It can be argued that it was this situation which led to an increasing amount of corruption, serious operational problems, inefficiencies and other administrative problems.

3.4 The Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front and the Civil Service Reforms

The Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), after coming to power in May 1991 by overthrowing the Dergue regime, set up a transitional government (1991-1994) and subsequently a Federal Democratic Government in December 1995. This government has been taking different reform measures in the political, economic and social spheres. The major changes include the move from a centralised unitary state to an ethnic based decentralised state; a shift from a command economy to a market-based economy in the context of a structural adjustment; and the introduction of a multi-party electoral system. The EPRDF government has also taken different specific measures, one of which is civil service reform. So far the government has implemented two phases of civil service reform.

3.4.1 Phase I: 1991 - 1996

The measures taken include the initial actions of the EPRDF to overhaul the civil service system. As claimed by the government (Office of the Prime Minister of Ethiopia 1994), some of the reasons for taking the reform measures were the following:

· the rules and regulations governing the civil service are outmoded and outdated.;

· the civil service is characterised by a general lack of experience in plan execution;

· the civil service does not have a structural set up that is amenable to plan execution as well as to effective monitoring and control;

· there is a lack of clearly defined management systems and procedures in the management of personnel, finance and property; and

· there was inadequate managerial know-how, lack of standard job classification, weaknesses in manpower planning and utilisation.

In order to alleviate the above problems of the civil service, the government established an Inter-Ministerial Committee (task force) consisting of representatives from the Prime Minister's Office, Ministries of Education, Finance, Planning and Economic Development, Labour and Social Affairs and the Public Service Commission. The committee was mandated to review the appropriateness of the then existing structure of government in the light of the new economic policy and devolution measures. It was given the task of reviewing the whole civil service administrative system so as to recommend ways and means of renovation¹¹ (Office of the Prime Minister of Ethiopia 1994). In doing so, the task force had in turn created six sub-committees to work on the restructuring of institutions; civil service pay; position classification; personnel directives and manuals; efficiency, effectiveness and accountability; and training (Office of the Prime Minister of Ethiopia 1994). This task force submitted draft proposals on the salary scale, allowances and benefits of the civil service. A study on working conditions and occupational safety was underway. A study on position classifications in the civil service had been made and its proposals had been submitted. Nonetheless, all the above studies have not been put into action. The committee had also submitted a study on ways of restructuring the central government institutions (Ministries and Commissions) as well as a manning plan for the same.

The other major reform measure taken during the first phase was the issuance of a retrenchment policy in November 1993. The policy resulted in the retrenchment of civil servants and employees of public enterprises who were said to be redundant. There were confusing justifications for the retrenched workers. On the one hand, it was claimed that the removal of the civil servants and employees was the result of the rationalisation of government structures (as part of the structural adjustment policy) and the review of job positions. On the other hand, there was also a predetermined percentage set on the number of persons to be retrenched per establishment. In specific terms, there was a reduction of 10% of employees in an undertaking. In the case of undertakings where the number of employees was between twenty and fifty, a reduction of employees affecting at least five was required (Atkilt 1997). If the retrenchment was based on a review of job positions, one might wonder why there was a need to set ahead a fixed percentage of employees to be retrenched. Table 1 shows the result of the retrenchment and redeployment program.

Table 1. Civil servants and employees of public enterprises retrenched and
redeployed as of July 7/1996

SOURCE: Social and Administrative Sub-sector of Office of the Prime Minister

(in Atkilt 1997).

In addition to the above two major reforms, i.e., the restructuring of the government institutional and the retrenchment programs, the following civil service reform measures were taken (Office of the Prime Minister of Ethiopia 1994):

· terminating automatic assignment of fresh graduates of higher institutions to public organisations;

· lifting the order which denies the periodic salary increment for those who earn a monthly salary of Br 636 and above;

· revising the rate of per diem payments for the civil service;

· cancelling the policy that denies the right to resign from duty, especially for the semi-professional and professional workers in the civil service;

· raising the lowest pay of the civil servant from Br. 50 to Br. 105. as of September 1990;

· approving salary increments for teachers, doctors and university professors;

· Freezing recruitment in the civil service except for some crucial positions.

The above were the reform measures taken by the EPRDF within the first three years after coming to power.

3.4.2 Phase II: 1996 - Present

This phase can be considered as another enhanced process of Ethiopian civil service reform. As pointed out by the government, the reform is a continuation of the structural and economic reform process that began in 1992. It is also taken as one aspect of the development strategy and reform measure that the Ethiopian government plans to implement during the three year period of 1998/9 -2000/1 (Government of Ethiopia 1998).

The second phase of the civil service reform was comprehensive and included five major sub-programs. The following are the details regarding the sub-programs and the expected outcomes (Office of the Prime Minister of Ethiopia 1998, in Amharic; Government of Ethiopia 1998.)

THE EXPENDITURE MANAGEMENT AND CONTROL SUB-PROGRAM: The sub-program is under the responsibility of the Ministry of Finance. Under this program, by the year 2000/1, it is expected to develop a comprehensive legal framework for the entire financial management of the civil service; develop a system where budget appropriation and execution is done by taking into consideration governmental priorities as well as yearly and medium term plans of the concerned institutions; institute an improved system where by government financial resources can be properly received, maintained and utilised; bring about better accountability to the Council of Representatives and develop human resources that possess professional knowledge and qualifications in financial management and control.

HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT SUB-PROGRAM: The major aim of the program is to modernise the human resource management in the civil service so as to develop an effective and efficient civil service. The responsibility of this sub-program is given to the Federal Civil Service Commission. The sub-program, by the year 2000/1, will have developed the following: a refined system for administering the employees of the civil service institutions in a just and equitable manner; a system of pay and promotion which is directly related to merit/performance; an effective system which allows the development of a human resources plan so as to implement government policies and priorities; comprehensive and uniform rules and regulations for managing the human resources of the civil service and an adequate number of knowledgeable and capable employees in the civil service.

TOP MANAGEMENT SYSTEM SUB-PROGRAM: the sub program is housed in the Office of the Prime Minister and will work towards the improvement and selection of senior government officials. The objectives of the reform program, for the year 2000/1, are to see strategic management approaches being followed in the planning, implementation and control of the total operations of federal institutions; to improve the practice of management, especially in the areas of planning and controlling, delegation of authority, responsibility and accountability, in the federal and regional institutions; and to have improvements in the structure of the Prime Minister's Office.

SERVICE DELIVERY AND QUALITY OF SERVICE SUB-PROGRAM: the program is under the Office of the Prime Minister and is designed to improve the quality of service provided by public sector employees and includes the establishment of a complaint-handling mechanism. The program, by the year 2000/1, will have made civil service institutions follow an appropriate and improved system of service delivery so as to give service to the public in an effective, efficient, transparent and impartial manner; the employees of the civil service institutions have the responsibility and obligation to provide quality service to the public fairly, equitably, honestly, efficiently and effectively.

THE ETHICS AND JUDICIAL REFORM SUB-PROGRAM: the sub-program will be under the responsibility of the Office of the Prime Minister. By the year 2000/1, it will improve awareness of civil service personnel that government activities should be free of fraud, embezzlement, corruption and other unwanted mal-practices; develop a feeling of commitment, among the civil service employees, to an appropriate use of government money and resources; develop necessary arrangements to have ethical practices in federal institutions and regional governments; improve the capacity of the police, courts and attorneys to investigate and pronounce on unethical practices; improve the capability of the media to adequately search, investigate and publicise unethical practices of government bodies; develop a code of conduct and educate the society about the need for and importance of ethical practices; and create institutions that will follow up and control unethical practices.

The whole program is managed by a high level committee led by the Prime Minister of the country and the members include: the Deputy Prime-Minister and the Ministry of Defence of the country; the head of Social and Administrative Division in the Prime Minister's Office, with the rank of Minister, directors of the sub-programs, and high-level experts. This committee is responsible for making strategic decisions about the programs, enhancing the participation of the regional administrations and federal institutions and reporting to Parliament.

Under this committee, there is a unit in the Office of the Prime Minister responsible for co-ordinating the activities of the sub-programs. The unit acts as a secretariat of the high-level committee, gives support services to the sub-programs; arranges systems for evaluating the tasks of the sub-programs, and serves as a public relations office.

The above are the components of Phase II of the civil service reform program and the manner in which they are being managed. As can be gathered from the above discussion, civil service reform measures have been taken at different times by the different regimes in power. But the reform measure being taken by the EPRDF government is the most extensive, ambitious, demanding and difficult. In the following paragraphs initial observations on the reform measures will be outlined.

4. INITIAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE REFORM MEASURES

As can be gathered from the above discussion, the current government has taken various steps to reform the whole system of the civil service. The reform measures are comprehensive and are expected to tackle complex and difficult institutional, structural and procedural issues. They are also intended to improve the performance and productivity of existing government institutions and to build or reinforce organisational, managerial and technical capacity.

The reform measures are vital and there is no question about their relevance to the Ethiopian case, especially when considering the socio-economic and political reform programs the country is planning to follow. The reform is apparently necessary since the ineffectiveness of the civil service can threaten all development efforts and can adversely affect all government activity and the economy as a whole.

In the following paragraphs, critical comments on the current government civil service reform measures will be put forward. As indicated above, many of the second phase reform measures are expected to be implemented beginning in the year 2000/1 and it will be premature and difficult to analyse and discuss the impact of these measures. But it is possible to look into the impact of the first phase of the reform, i.e., the retrenchment program, and to critically analyse the second phase reform by touching upon its content, the manner it originated and is being processed.

4.1 Observations on the Retrenchment Program

As pointed out earlier, the retrenchment program was one basic part of the first phase reform measures taken by the current government. The content of the program was similar to that undertaken in various developing countries in the 1980s as part of the World Bank lending operations to support civil service reforms. The surprising fact about the program is that it was made to be implemented in a country where the number of the civil service is very small (4 civil servants for 1000 people) as compared to some African countries (29 civil servants for 1000 people) and the developed countries (77 civil servants for 1000) (Atkilt 1997, 38; Asmelash 1998). It is also to be implemented in a country where the government's recurrent expenditure per civil servant is one of the lowest in the world (Atkilt 1997, 38; Asmelash 1998). The retrenchment program has been implemented and has resulted in the removal of a good number of employees. Redundancy programs have been arranged to mitigate the social impact of the reform. From what has been gathered through discussions, the following are considered to be the impacts of the program:

· Reform has momentarily had a downsizing impact on the number of civil servants (1421 civil servants according to Asmelash 1998). But the fiscal and efficiency impacts seem substantially less than expected.

· It has resulted in the removal of capable individuals who were apparently associated with the former regime. Some have pointed out that the retrenchment was used to settle political scores and has further eroded limited administrative capacity.

· The program has also resulted in creating a climate of uncertainty in the civil service. As informants for this study said, the impact is being felt in the second phase reform measures. Employees in some of the civil service institutions feel threatened by the second phase reform measures, thinking that there could be another round of reduction of employees when the new measures are implemented.

· It has resulted in a substantial social impact, especially if one considers the fact that each civil servant's salary is shared among five to ten direct and extended family members. Thus, it has created a situation where some members of the society have developed feelings of hatred and mistrust for the regime.

· It has resulted in the creation of a large number of contract employees in many government organisations since recruiting permanent employees has stopped. However, as can be observed from the following table, there is still an overall increase in the number of the civil servants.

Table 2. Number of civil servants, 1975 - 1996

Year	Civil servants	Year	Civil servants
1975	104,147	1993	No data
1989	234,312	1994	No data
1990	236,410	1995	293,452
1991	216,058	1996	287,716

SOURCE: Documents of the Federal Civil Service Commission (1999).

4.2 Observations on the Second Phase Reforms

As indicated above the second phase reform is an extensive program that includes different sub-programs that are expected to over-haul the whole civil service system. No one would question the importance and relevance of the programs, especially at this point in time when the country is initiating far-reaching socio-political and economic policy measures. An important success area of the reform process is that it has strong political support and commitment at the top level. As the experiences of other countries attest, the commitment and support of the highest level political authorities is identified consistently as a major influence on implementing the reforms (see Kaul 1997). The reform in Ethiopia seems to have the necessary high-level political support.

Nonetheless, as is going to be argued in the following paragraphs, the manner the reform program is initiated and administered as well as the feasibility of implementing it seems to be doubtful. The following are some of the observations.

4.2.1 The Rationale for Initiating the Reforms Is Weakly Articulated

Initiatives for reforms, especially of such a comprehensive nature, have to be well prepared and refined. There has to be an unbiased analysis of existing practices and problems and an objective understanding of their impact. But when taking the Ethiopian case, the way the reform measures were initiated and designed seems to be improper. A case in point is the contradictory and confusing reports of the task force and the Federal Civil Service Commission about the nature of the civil service. As indicated in the task force report, it is said that the basic reason for having the reform measures is that the civil service is ineffective, inefficient, incapacitated, not trusted by the public, demoralised and demotivated, unfit for modern managerial techniques, guided by obsolete and useless rules and regulations and the like.

One would doubt the above assertion when considering the major achievements of the civil service as reported by an official from the Federal Civil Service Commission (Atkilt 1998, 76):

Minimum qualification requirements are set for each classified position. In the majority of cases, recruitment, promotion and salary increments are carried out on the basis of the merit system; education, experience and performance are the principal bases for promotion and salary increments; uniform disciplinary procedures are applied in the civil service and the right of the civil servants to appeal to a central administration tribunal is recognised; adherence of personnel actions to civil service rules, regulations and procedures is centrally inspected; training of civil servants and managers is conducted to upgrade their capacity and competence; all position[s] in the civil service are classified and salaries and allowances are centrally determined.

The above two reports throw doubt on the reliability of the reform initiatives. This is more so when considering the extent to which the existing practices and norms are diagnosed in a proper manner; the degree to which the need for new organisational structures and management systems is assessed; and the extent to which the constraints faced are openly and objectively analysed. Rather as Asmelash (1998, 34) indicated:

... the civil service reform recommendations have not been presented for discussion and review by the Council of Ministers. The areas identified in the second phase reform apparently reflected the concerns of the Ex-Deputy Prime Minister (derived from his observations as Prime Minister of the Transitional Government) of the civil service and the expatriate co-ordinator's observation of what constituted bottlenecks in the management of the civil service.

4.2.2 The Necessary Conditions for the Reform are Either Lacking or Undeveloped

As can be in referred from the theoretical part of the paper, the whole reform measure is identical with the components of the NPM model. When referring to the success stories of the countries that have implemented the reform measures, it calls for fulfilling various complex preconditions, which apparently are lacking in the Ethiopian case. The following are only some of them:

· Absence of well developed bureaucratic structure with competent personnel:

The literature (Shand 1996; Massy 1997; Warrington 1997) indicates that NPM is the last stage of the development of the public administration system of capitalist economies, where both public and private sectors existed in developed form for some time. It is also pointed out that NPM is the termination of a number of incremental steps such as Taylorism, PPBS, performance measurement and performance improvement, and successive measures of decentralisation. This is evident in some developed countries (for example, New Zealand, Canada, United Kingdom) where the reform measures have improved the existing well developed and well trained administrative system further (Ibid).

The Ethiopian situation and experience, however, attest that currently there seems to be a serious shortage of a professionally recruited and trained bureaucracy. The quality of administrative performance seems to be deficient. Thus, the reality in the country reveals the absence of a well-developed administrative system. However, the whole civil service system is forced to move blindly from one end to another. The following comment, given by an author, also applies to Ethiopia.

There was no conscious effort to question whether the public administration system and individual administrators can make this quantum jump from not having a modern merit based bureaucracy to the most sophisticated stage which very few western countries have achieved - it took England and New Zealand many decades in an already capitalist democratic entity to reach the stage of NPM (Warrington 1997).

Moreover, to make things worse, as was indicated in the previous chapter, the reform in Ethiopia is expected to be implemented within three years. It seems to be quite ambitious to try introduce this model of NPM in such an economically backward country in a short period of time, without laying the essential background work in capacity building and in other areas of administration.

· Lack of proper governance environment:

As many authors have pointed out, the whole process of NPM requires, among other things, a macro institutional/governance environment which is characterised by the presence of institutions that could provide checks and balances and enhance accountability (Pirotta 1997; Warrington 1997). It also requires a system of rule of law reflected by the existence of a credible and independent judicial system as well as openness and transparency. NPM also demands that appointment and promotion be made on the basis of merit rather than political and personal loyalty.

When considering the Ethiopian situation, the above preconditions for NPM are yet to be fulfilled. Rather, one observes the pre-eminence of a one-party system that has dominance over the executive, legislative and judiciary bodies. There is also a lack of appropriate institutions or fora for citizens to express their views collectively or individually on public issues. Effectively functioning opposition political parties and strong interest groups seem to be non-existent. The mass media and independent press are underdeveloped and the presence of the rule of law is highly questionable.

As a result of the above situation in Ethiopia, there seems to be a concentration and monopolisation of power by the higher political officers and a lack of accountability, responsiveness and transparency. Political patronage in appointment and promotions, and ministerial interference in matters of administration are not uncommon. Moreover, despite the rhetoric of reform, there is still no guarantee that the best candidates are selected to be employed in the civil service and that those most capable of managing will be allowed to do so. Given these, the effective implementation of the civil service reforms becomes questionable.

· Lack of participation by key stakeholders:

It would appear from the interview that the various middle-level officials of the ministries and other actors and stakeholder, who are going to be affected by the reform, have not been actively and adequately involved in the drawing-up of the reform projects and the modalities of their implementation. As can be seen from the experience of different countries, however, it is important that the reform programs draw on the knowledge and experience of local decision-makers and officials in a participative way to diagnose the problems faced (see for example Hibault 1996).

Furthermore, in Ethiopia, the reform effort seems to lack the required level of participation from the various regional governments (save the recent planned attempts to include three regional governments as pilot institutions to test the human resource management sub-program reform measures). As Asmelash (1998, 35) has pointed out `Failure to mobilise the regions behind the civil service reform, however, could seriously hamper the effectiveness of the operation of the federal civil service it self.'

· Attitudinal problem:

The other basic requirement for the effective implementation of the reform measures is an attitudinal change among the members of the civil service. As indicated earlier, the framework for civil service reform emphasises the need for more attitudinal changes rather than reinforcing or strengthening existing organisations, structures and methods. The experience of Botswana in managing civil service reforms can be aptly described as springing from a mental attitude that constantly strives for and achieves improvement in changing circumstances. As Modisi (1995) indicated, in Botswana, the main ingredients include clarity of vision, the mustering of a consistent collective will, harnessing of mutual social responsibility and the dedication and diligence of individuals in pursuit of improvement in attaining objectives.

In the Ethiopian case, the civil servant seems pessimistic about the whole reform process. The participation and awareness of the different stakeholders (civil servants, the general public, the private sector and other groups) is very minimal. As has been pointed out above, some civil servants assume that the reform measure will result in another round of retrenchment. The higher officials seem uninterested in mobilising support from the public that is going to be affected by the reform. Necessary motivating measures such as competitive salary and benefit schemes for the civil service hardly exist. In this situation one may wonder how the reform measures, especially service delivery and ethics, are going to be implemented.

· Absence of strong institutional framework:

The reform measures basically comprise a large number of activities whose implementation involves many parties - individuals, groups, institutions, ministries and divisions. They also call for new initiatives, collaboration and high-level co-ordination and tremendous amount of work. In this type of project, therefore, performance depends largely on the established institutional framework. As stated by Hibault (1996) this framework must include a structure that enjoys considerable prestige and has the necessary authority to ensure good co-ordination between the parties.

In the Ethiopian case, such a framework doesn't seem to exist. For instance as Asmelash (1998) has pointed out with regard to the core co-ordinating unit in the Office of the Prime Minister, `... one wonders if a small unit within the PMO would have sufficient visibility, prestige and authority to make it credible in the eyes of its clientele group."

Moreover, as has been gathered from many of the informants to this study, most of the human resource management reform components are being carried out by committees. The members of the committees have their regular duties and take their work in the committees as an additional assignment. This goes against the success stories of civil service reforms, which demand adequate technical capacity with the required skills, resources and especially adequate time to achieve set targets.

4.2.3 The Reform Program is Donor-Driven and Is Implemented As a Condition for Economic Assistance

As in the case of most developing countries¹², it seems obvious that the civil service reform is initiated by the donors as part of the structural adjustment program. The donors have been playing an active role in building the political commitment at the centre and acting as advocates of the reform. They have also taken the lead in diagnosing problems and devising reform strategies.

The whole process of reform is also attached to financial conditionalities. As has been indicated elsewhere (Paulos 1998), the basic idea of requiring any kind of reform as a precondition for economic assistance can be considered as a highly interventionist, impractical, and probably unethical act. To succeed reforms cannot be simply directed by outsiders. Instead, there should be coherent demands from the society at large and there is need for genuine conviction by the government. If this is not the case, donor driven reforms will lead governments to pay lip-service to reforms, lacking the desire to see major reforms taking place.

According to the experience of various countries, this donor-driven cum financially-conditioned reforms will undermine ownership and commitment from the government as well as from the public. As Nelson (1992, 315) pointed out, "...without ownership, extensive use of conditions is likely to produce elaborate games of superficial or partial compliance, failure to adopt key supplementary measures to make the reforms effective, or a trial to reform efforts launched and abandoned. These games are worse than frustrating."

4.2.4 The Reform Measures Are Mere Transplantations

As in other Sub-Saharan countries, many of the reform measures are transplanted into Ethiopia from the developed countries. This, however, does not imply that outside experience is irrelevant. It simply means that there is a need to ensure that the various preconditions, the necessary capacity and resources exist before taking the measures.

In other words, the argument is that if the measures are simply transplanted, the reform proposals may be too vague or too confusing to be easily put into practice and could be unrelated to the existing situation in a particular country. Those who are responsible for implementing them may have very little understanding of what is supposed to be happening or of what has been proposed. This might be true if one takes only the issues of service delivery and setting of performance measurements - two elements in the Ethiopian civil service reform program.

As indicated earlier, service delivery is one of the basic reform measures to be implemented. It is true that there is a need to encourage service users to demand more from governments; and governments should believe that it is the pressure from its customers that will force improvement on what the public services offer. As the experiences of the other developed countries show, the move for service delivery was brought about because informed taxpayers and citizens indicated a clear limit to their willingness to purchase unattractive and inefficiently produced public services (Kaul 1997). In these countries tax contributions and electoral issues were being increasingly shaped by dissatisfaction with public services (Kaul 1997). When taking the Ethiopian case, certain basic questions need to be answered: do taxpayers know whom they are paying and why they are paying? Are there taxpayers who are willing to pay solely because they should pay and get services? Does the country have an experience of a proper electoral process? These and other issues need to be addressed before pondering on the issue of service delivery. It is difficult to address the issues of service delivery in a country where the formation of a consumers association and other pressure groups seems to be impossible.

The question of customer focus, the main pillar of service delivery, is also problematic in its application. The public sector can make its service delivery more customer-friendly, but this will again breed its own problems. For instance, New Zealand charges a higher rate for faster passport turnaround; Ethiopia is doing the same. But the system, as indicated by Larson (1997, 136), is creating a two-tiered system in which one formally recognises that wealthier citizens have the right to get more from their government. The move is inculcating discrimination and appears to be against the diction that `All citizens are equal before the law and before the state'.

According to the new reform measures, the civil service is required to measure its performance. That is, there is a need to develop a consistent set of performance indicators to analyse the relationship between administrative process (inputs, outputs and outcomes) and administrative performance (efficiency, effectiveness, innovation and responsiveness).

This task of setting indicators and measuring performance is, however, highly demanding and difficult in the public sector. Taking the case of the developed countries, Iglesias (1986) pointed out that it is a system which has practical difficulties in its application and might even lead not only to a superficial analysis of the component elements of process and performance, but to a deflection of attention from the real substance of administration. This is because searching for the indices which will be used as criteria and units of measurement is highly complex and illusive.

As Carter (1992, 87) pointed out, performance indicators were very much a fashion of the 1980's; they were embraced at the highest level of government and promulgated throughout the public sector. There is a fear that they could join the string of failed and forgotten managerial reform systems that include PPB (Planning, Programming, Budgeting) and PAR (Program Analysis Review).

Generally, setting performance indicators for activities in the public sector will be a difficult and demanding task. Given this fact, one may question the possibility of setting performance indicators for each area of activity in the Ethiopian civil service amidst severe problems such as: incapacitated and demotivated civil servants, unavailability of the most elementary equipment and facilities in the organisations, absence of guiding objectives and missions, paucity of data and poor information systems.

The above two examples can perhaps demonstrate the importance and the need for a proper analysis of each country prior to the introduction of any reform measure in the administration system.

5. CONCLUDING REMARKS

In this paper, a modest attempt has been made to raise some issues concerning the Ethiopian civil service reform by showing the development of the civil service and the various reform measures that have been taken in the past. Initial observations have been made on the reforms currently in progress and their importance in the context of the present socio-political and economic changes has been stressed.

The paper argues that the basic reasons behind the weaknesses of the civil service seem not to have been properly articulated and diagnosed. It seems that the reform measures are introduced without giving due attention to the country's administrative history, existing political reality, administrative capacity and economic structure. The prescriptions are mere transplantations and are impositions made without understanding the context. As Warrington (1997) pointed out, it has to be understood that habits of thought and patterns of behaviour are likely to persist as long as the circumstances that give rise to them exist. Thus, it will be fallacious to assume that reforms in organisation structures, revised career paths and mechanisms for recognition and reward, however significant in themselves, are sufficient to have an efficient civil service without addressing critical issues such as governance and economic environment.

It has been argued that, the preconditions for the reform measures seem undeveloped, whereas those countries that are following the `New Public Management' are using it to improve their already well developed administrative system. But in countries such as Ethiopia, where an inadequate administrative system is entangled with problems such as poor civil service pay and compensation system; undue share of the posts being political appointments rather than career posts; a substandard training system; lack of trust, respect and confidence by the politicians of the career civil service, it will be wishful thinking to implement the measures. Moreover, the reform measures are too comprehensive and ambitious and it is doubtful whether the country can accommodate and implement such changes in a short period of time.

Finally it needs to be said that the problems of the civil service require thorough diagnosis and sustained thought about the way to bring about attitudinal changes. The reform measures need to be executed incrementally through identifying priority areas in the light of the capacity to implement the measures.

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NOTES

1 Proposes incremental change to the classic model of public administration (administrative self-management; a clear delimitation of political interference in the administration; promotion system based on merit and seniority). The model assumes that public administration and private management should be treated as substantially different.

2 This model accepts the classical model, but heavily questions its relevance for some parts of the public sector.

3 The post-bureaucratic reform `paradigm', like many of the features of the `New Public Management', is argued to have features such as being anticipatory, strategic, result- oriented, based on executive leadership (rather than explicitly political leadership), market- oriented, customer-driven, entrepreneurial public sector (Massey 1997, 9).

4 The approach assumes that all human behaviour is dominated by self-interest. Individuals are rational utility maximisers. The theory endorses political agendas such as minimizing the role of the state, selling the state's commercial assets, curbing the functions of government agencies etc. (Keraudren and Mierlo 1998).

5 Agency theory rests on the notion that social and political life can be understood as a series of contracts ...the agent undertakes to perform various tasks on behalf of the principal and in exchange the principal agrees to reward the agent in a mutually acceptable way. This theory is useful in analysing a range of policy issues, particularly those concerned with the selection of agents, the design of remuneration systems and the choice of institutional arrangement (Shand 1996).

6 See for example Shand (1996) who argues that NPM was not altogether new. He stresses that in the last thirty years many countries had pursued different reforms, described variously as program budgeting, management by objective and accountable management and the like. Many organisations had developed their initiatives focusing on efficiency, effectiveness and customers service. But generally "what appears to be different about current reforms is the greater scope, involving in many cases significant changes to the boundaries and structure of the public sector, a greater sense of urgency and a more comprehensive or strategic, approach to reform recognizing the interdependence of different aspects of the reform."

7 As Massey (1997, 27) pointed out "there is currently little or no basis for arguing that NPM strategies objectively increase the effectiveness of public sector organizations. There is scant evidence that the adoption of NPM triggers or facilitates economic success... in many instances its adoption may be simply symbolic, the adoption of rituals deemed legitimate by significant elites, whether or not they have any effect."

8 As Larson (1997) pointed out, it would be a mistake to write off the public sector values as being inconsequential or irrelevant and replace them with private sector values. The fact is that public sector values are there for a reason - they are the only way to gain widespread support for the independent institutions of government. And without them, the ability of the state to generate and maintain social legitimacy will rapidly decline.

9 This is to mean, taking Abir (1968, 115), a centralised administration whereby all important appointments were made by the king and each official in the hierarchy was directly responsible to him. In this system officials continued at their posts for as long as they retained the royal favour, which they endeavoured to cultivate by acts calculated to impress the king with their devotion and fidelity (see also Asmelash 1972, 129).

10 Twelve ministries were set up by "an order to define the powers and duties of Our Ministers, No 1 of 1943", and these were: communication and public works; education and fine arts; commerce; industry and agriculture; the interior; foreign affairs; finance; war; the Pen; justice; posts, telephones and telegraphs (Perham 1969).

11 This includes reviewing existing civil service law, position classification scheme, salary structure, allowances and benefits; training programmes in the civil service; the utilisation of optimal civil service manpower; and making recommendations on ways of installing a civil service system that is cost effective, accountable and efficient; reviewing the system of performance evaluation and recommending another system, assessing the manpower of the current civil service and recommending the appropriate level, identifying redundant staff (position) and recommending staff redeployment; recommending a retrenchment policy; identifying the staff to be retrenched and other related tasks (Office of the Prime Minister of Ethiopia 1994).

12 As Larbi (1999, 2) pointed out "in the case of most developing countries, reforms in public administration and management have been driven more by external pressures and have taken place in the context of structural adjustment programmes."

13 This can be because, first, the objectives and the programs on which the indices will be based may compete with each other; may be inconsistent; may not be clearly defined; may often deliberately be left unclear and imprecise; may change in the process of implementation; are subject to changing interpretations to suit changing situations. Second, the different forms of performance may not be clearly identified; what they are measuring may not be precisely defined, may move in an opposite direction or there will be difficult to prioritise (Iglesias 1986; Carter 1992).

* Departmeny of Management and Public Administration, Addis Ababa University