Governance And Good Governance

• The term Governance as it was initially perceived under NPM perspective as 1990s was often described as-

"Governance refers to using not just government institutional mechanics and government coercive power, rather its use of plural institution mechanism and plural actors and facilitative powers rather than coercive power.

                      Quantity                                          Quality

Thus an initial understanding of governance had a two fold focus
1)Plural Actors instead of single Actor or institution
2)Quality of regulation or power Authority rather than Quantity

However later it was noted that this interpretation of governance was narrow, it was argued that term governance is not "a neutral term" rather its value ladden concept having a inbulit positive connotation as in good governance.
(ie.. the word good goes without saying whenever the word governance is used)

It was argued that institution pluralism and reduced government control and regulation by themseves are no guarantee for Good Governance and may not be sufficient description of GG.

As a result , the description of governance or GG was refined to capture goal orientation of governance or GG was refined to capture goal orientation of governance rather than instrumentality orientation of governance.

In other words GG started being described in terms of certain standard of function which will ensure and promote stated goal of society, also described that ultimate goal of any government or administration is to seek widest possible inclusion of population and under this perspective importance of question whether government has dominant or significant or shared /insignificant role becomes de-emphasized or less relevant.

In other words , Good Governance concept was initially viewed in late 1980s and whole 90s as almost a parallel of NPM. However , later it was broadened and more mature connotation somewhat like similar to NPS is now seen speically in developing countries.


Thus, for a common man the term governance or GG is more a question of whether he gets what he can validly aspire for as a citizen of the country whether government felicitates him , getting it through other means is largely irrelevant to him.

Good Governance

GG in terms of its ideal explanation refers to a well performing and qualitative improvement administrative system which can contribute to administrative goal of society.

It cannot be narrowly interpreted to mean exclusive GG ie.. GG for few rather it has to be for masses. 

In this context one way to describe the broad connotation of GG is through the tripod of market , government and civil society.

Where civil society demands GG from both.

Thus, the idea is that civil society can and should demand GG from both the government and market.
Thus ideally GG is a concept which should give the right to citizen to demand efficiency and quality from both the actors.(Government and non government).

World Bank -Concept of GG

The concept of GG owes its origin to World Bank which defined the term in 1992 as under-

"GG is the manner in which the power is exercised in arrangement of country's economy and social resources for development "






GG concept given by world bank in backdrop of studies conducted in Saharan region of Africa in 1920s , its main conclusion was economic reforms in those countries are failing because of their failure of administrative institution .

In other words it was concluded that inefficient administrative system or poor governance are reasons behind the economic backwardness or failure of economic reforms.

WB also argued that economic developmental aid would not serve much purpose in bringing out reforms unless untill there is good administartion.

In 1992 world bank published a report entittled government and development in which GG was described as central requirement for creating and sustaining an environment reforms and development.

In this report three aspects of GG are identified-

1)The form of political regime ie..whether military regime or parliament or dictatorial government.

2)Processs by which authority is exercised ie whether its centralized process where government being dominant player or whether its decentralized or democratic or shared process.

3)Capacity of government in designing , formulating and implementing policies.


The further Analysis of these three central aspects led to an expectation of inbuilt essentials or features of GG.


i)Political Accountability of government- iee govt in power is accountable to people or not . Suggestion here is that a democratically elected government is likely to be more respinsible and accountable to people rather than dictatorial or totalitarian  regime.

ii)Independent Judiciary ie well established legal framework of development where there is operation of Rule of Law and indepnedent Judiciary to ensure three things-

• a)Protection of Human rights
• b)Social studies
• c)Fair Functioning of market (its becuase Judiciary shouldn't be pro govt, if an occasion arises where govt is involved in dispute)

iii)Sound Administrative system which can lead to efficiency and effectiveness , it requires that bureaucracy should be fast , accountable and transparent (FAT) (N. vittal)

iv)Policy environment which favors poverty reduction and economic growth.It requires sound macroeconomics and fiscal and financial policies and also prioritization of government expenditure. It also includes evolving a framework for government business corporation.

v)A pro poor emphais in public spending ie protecting vulnerbale through a safety net which is at same time affordable to home countries.

vi)Adequate investment in people and creating social capital. This can be done through investment in basic health , infrastructure and education. Manrega etc

vii)Freedom of information and expression to people -RTI-so that they can play a role in formulation , monitoring , evaluation of government policies and program.

viii)protection of environment so as to ensure growth and development doesn't cause sustainable environment degradation.

The world bank observed as under in its concluding remark in the report "Citizens need to demand Good Governance and their ability to do so has been enhanced by literacy , education and employment opportunities, therefore government needs to be responsive to these demands"

Criticism of World Bank concept of GG

1.The word good in GG is not standard ie the concept of GG or administrative reforms is subjective and context specific idea rather than an objective and universal idea.

2.As a result a single set of prescription cannot be used as a one best model for International standard.

Practice of GG, moreover, the inherent ideas in GG like democratisation , openness of maerket economy , protection of Human rights or government market corporation are all subject issues where the relativeness is more significant than absoluteness.

Thus , to prescribe a global mono culture in the name of GG is always goin to be insensitive to contextual complexities.

3.Hidden Agenda /Politics of GG-

has been argued specially by Anti development proponents or people subscribing anti development thesis that behind GG and its prescription in form of aid conditions there is hidden agenda of western nations . They argue World bank prescription is governed by selfish motivation of propagation of western ideology and western economy and commercial interests.

In this context, A.leftwich observed  that development assistance to third world countries in post cold war era is guided by politics of GG meaning thereby that WB and western donor countries insist in a market friendly economical environment in the aid recipient countries .

Thus, he argued that there is hidden motive of self interest behind such charity.

3.It suffers from  Typical donor mentality , it has been argued by critics that donor typically has mentality of "i will donate money and then i will tell you how to spend or best use this money in your best interest".

Thus, its being crticised that donor can never be in position to correctly appreciate the precise requirement and priority of reciepient and its recommendation would always stands to be 

-Theoritical

-Utopian

-Monoculture and ven biased towards self interest.

Thus, the donor should understand that the moment he donated its recipient's money and reciepient should use the money as per his requirement rather than as per donor suggestion thus GG in form of all the conditionality isn't a great idea.

4.Wrong Focus-It has been argued by another form of critics. WB concerns has focussed on instrumentation rather than the goals, In this context George Fredicson has noted as under "GG is more a prescription of doing things rightly rather than doing right things"

In this context Fredison again noted that GG reflects anti-govt., anti bureaucratic and anti democratic sentiments meaning thereby he is suggesting that GG is similar to NPM which de-emphasis government and over-emphasises market and LPG with result that the status of and the trust in democratically elected government in home countries gets diluted and eroded.

Thus, World Bank concepts of Good Governance and its strong prescription in form of aid conditionality has been viewed with lot of skepticism mainly cause it has heavy doses of market orientation and tends to create a culture where government role gets marginalized.

Reconciliation

From above discussion it can be seen that concept of GG can be perceived in two ways-

1)In a relatively narrow way in the form of WB prescription of GG which is often seen as a NPM like Market friendly concept.

2)In a relatively broader way where GG is interpreted as ethical model of administartive improvement which is people friendly,this interpretation is closer to concept of NPS , public governance . 

Thus the concept of GG as we know today can be understood correctly only when the context in which its being used is clear, if its being used in World Bank sense theory , its often narrowly interpreted but when used in simple engineering terminology then its representative of government which is good ie..efficient in terms of indicators which people value like transparency , accountability , empowerment , service , ethics etc.

Application of concept of GG in some developed and developing countries

AFter strong emphassis GG received in 1992 and coinciding with reengineering and reinventing model of administration.

Many countries applied their idea of administration.

Experience of some countries are summarised below

CANADA-

Ist stage reform -

• in 1995 canada decided to go for major surgery where role and size , reinventing government , comprehensive audit of all government agency were carried out with certain question aiming of goal of GG like -

a)Whether this govt agency work in public interest.

b)is there something which government should do or can the private player do it.

c)It this function is retained with government , can it be performed more efficiently

• As a result, canadian administration did eliminate 72 government department and agencies and 47 others for restructured and commericalisation.

• Moreover, Government function were divided in two categories namely core and non core functions where non core function were either devolved to local government or transferred to private players through outsourcing , contracting or complete privatisation

IInd Stage Reforms-

• In 1997 canadian Administration went for large scale civil service reform and e-governance in a massive way so that collectively these reforms too can offer significant capacity enhancement for GG.

IIIrd stage Reform-

• Further  im year 2000 canada adopted a plan for renewal of public service wherein the two central ideas of making the civil servant more duty conscious by creating code of ethics and to fecilitate citizen empowerment , account and Good governance.

NewZeaLand

• Newzealand was one of front runner in implementing OECD model of NPM doctorine.
• Under this model Newzealnd went for services of reforms between late 1980s and 90s namely slimming the state wherein big percent of state activity were outsourced.

• Privatisation-Through which a good share of public sector ownership was privatised reforming the state by creating market friendly or commercial logic whereever possible .

• As a result user pay charges were introduced in almost all government services through 1990s in a gradual manner even the basic sectors like health and education started the system of partially user charge.

• In addition, Newzealand model of GG had two special features which could be of great significance to developing countries.

• Special social impact unit(SSIU) was set up in Newzealand administration as a government agency for corporation with community including NGOz and CSOs so that activities which have non commerical interests can be best peroformed and coordinated.

• Newzealand government relied on hybrid model of GG under which efficiency and ethics can be combined.
• for ex-In many socially relvent functions , public funding was retained but operation and service mechanics were kept outsourced.

Developing Nations

Phillipines

Phillipines has develpoed  very effective model  of GG called MARAKINA model/way of GG under it various reforms in field of urban governance and city.

Administration have been created by merging the reinventing , re-enginnering and NPS suggestions.


The key reforms were as under 
a) The Marakina city government extensively used ICT so as to make government more accesible and more prompt for example-Marakina municipal administration SMS based governance redressal mechanism pertaining to any civic amentities or civil service.

b)It focused on performance standard in administration  stand in administration by creating a system wherein for every PSU or a public agancies , cash inflows and cash outflows would be trapped and emphasis would be on resources genration rather than spending.

c)It created a model for co-option and partnership wherin all stakeholder like NGOs , CSOs , private players would be involved in projects like low cost housing , traffic management , city sanitation etc.

INDIA

1.In India attempts at decentralisation were made when 73rd and 74th Amedments Act was enacted with aim of giving grass root, level democratic participation to people and to create and strengthen a participative democracy for rural and urban local governance.

2.In 1996-7 , major attention was given to concept of GG with the then PM calling for conference of chief secretary of all states in 1996.This conference emphasised and maintenance of GG

a)Introduction of citizen charter as mechanism through which citizens would be entittled to improve quality of government services and interaction in terms of speed , accountability etc.

b)Participative program implementation under which consumer organisation and citizen groups like RWAs (Resident welfare Association), SHGs would be collaborated in administrative decision making.

c)Emphasis on periodic scrutiny of administrative peformance of administartive performance through mechanic like PAC(Public account committe) , CAG etc.


3.Later in 1997, PM called a conference of CMs of all states and 4 themes of GG were highlighted

i)To make administration accountable and citizen friendly 
ii)Promote and ensure transparency and felicitate right to info
iii)Taking measures to eradicate corruption from government services
iv)Focus on human resources management and better motivation as incentive for GG.

4.10 FYP was major landmark in context of GG in India because it identified GG as a single most important factor for achieving plan objective .
This plan emphasized following aspects of GG.

a)citizen empowerment through decentralisation
b)People participation in government programmer
c)Civil service Reforms
d)Promoting Transparency

e)Harnessing use of IT for Admin

f)Improved access to formal justice system to everyone

g)Rationalization of govt schemes to involve multilevel administartion to implement central schemes through state governments, PRIs, local bodies

5.The most important thrust for GG came in 2005 in formation of RTI .However since then various steps have been taken like creating a portal of people participation (M.Gov.in)

Apart from it there have been enhancement in perception of accounatbility through SC judgement on right to reject which makes it mandatory to have NOTA button.

Recently , PMs campaign for give it up is also stepped in right direction and is aimed at established , upbringing equity.