Reinventing Government

Friday, 28 May 2021

10:20 am
 
Presentation - June 14, 9 AM
Paper - June 18
 
Context in America
 1980s and 1990s
 Hege federal deficit
 Deteriorating basic services
o Worst public schools in the world
o Bad healthcare system
o Overcrowded prisons and courts
o Convicts walked free
 Poor public opinion on the government
 Debate during the 1990-1991 recession
o Should we pay taxes or should there be fewer services?
o More taxes so more money
o Less services so less expenses
 The old bureaucracy is not effective
o Monopolies of the government
 Usually deteriorate in quality
 No improvements because it is not incentivized by competition
o Bureaucracy should be fast on its feet, responsive, flexible, and
productive
 Organizations must be entrepreneurial rather than bureaucratic
o Entrepreneurial - use resources to maximize the results and outcome
 Does not mean "for profit"
 Shifts resources of an area of low productivity and minimal yield
into an area of higher productivity and greater yield
 The government invests money where it can get more
 Applies to public sector, nonprofit sector, and private sector
 Reinventing Government by David Osborne and Ted Gaebler
o They spent five years traveling around the country to examine most
entrepreneurial public organizations at state agencies, school districts,
etc.
 
Ten Principles of Reinventing Government
 Catalytic Government
o steering rather than rowing --> direction
o The government does not need to do everything on its own
 Coordination of all facets of society
 Community-owned government
o Empowering rather than serving
o Public agencies should encourage communities to take control of
services, providing money, training, technical assistance, create advisory
boards
o Government remains ultimately responsible for making sure services
reach those who need them
 o Community-owned - investment and ownership
 Competitive Government
o Injecting competition into service delivery
o Turn monopolies into competition
o Bid out services and projects to private sectors
 Mission-driven Government
o Transforming rule-driven organizations
 We rely a lot on the bureaucracy and rules in it
 But has it solved and reached our goal?
o Entrepreneurial government tends to minimize rules and focus on its
mission
o Ask the basic questions
 What is our mission?
 What is our goal?
 What are we trying to accomplish?
 What are the approaches/strategies/activities?
 How to design the budget?
 Result-oriented Government
o Finding outcomes, not inputs
o Accountability
 Customer-driven government
o Meeting the needs of customers not the bureaucracy
o The bureaucrats are more concerned with completing processes of the
government
o The best way to tie spending to results is to give the resource to the
customer and let that customer choose the service provider
o Providers are forced to be responsive to their customers to stay in
business
o Customers value a choice of services because they have different needs
o Limit the red-tape in order for customers to have a more convenient
experience -- customer should be the focus
 The customer will be satisfied, thus good public perception
 Can be translated into votes or reelection
o Community district 4 example
 Competition existed because parents can now choose which
schools they can enroll their children in
 So schools will be incentivized to be good to have more students
 Enterprising government
o Earning rather than spending
o Instead of government spending
o GOCCs can be used to be a source of income
 99% of LGUs are losing income in public markets
 It doesn't make sense that they're losing money because they
have the monopoly in those community
 Rates are too low sometimes
 Anticipatory government
o Prevention is cheaper than cure
 Better to prepare for the possible risks than dealing with the
problem when it comes
 We should always be ready --> calamities will always be there
 o Prevention vs. crisis management
 By creating and enforcing building codes,, installing sprinkler
systems, and working closely with developers on building plans
and construction, fire departments are beginning to enjoy savings
o Futures commissions
 Comprised of citizens from within the community who are charged
with the task of identifying and developing goals
 Prodding relevant public and private agencies into achieving them
o Strategic planning or comprehensive development planning
 Turned into three years -- in LGUs
 Examining and organization's current situation and future
trajectory, setting goals, developing a strategy to achieve those
goals
o Long-term budgeting
o Accrual vs. cash accounting
 Includes cost future obligations as expenses while cash
accounting record expenses only after the have been paid
o Cross-departmental budgeting
 Planning the budget in other departments -- even those that have
little contribution to the budgeting of a specific office
o Regional concerns
 Recognizing the impact of decisions made in neighboring
jurisdictions and anticipating regional problems have proven to be
beneficial for some governments
 Governments have realized that constituencies can be created to
monitor plans and react as any other special interest group might
 Decentralized Government
o From hierarchy to participation and teamwork
o Centralized decision-making has crippled the ability of organizations to
respond to various challenges
o Decentralized
 Health environment, Agriculture, Social services
 Devolving tasks to LGUs
o Seeks to empower those individuals who are in the best positions to
develop effective and innovative solutions to problems
 Market-oriented Government
o Leveraging change through the market
o The most effective way for government to meet the public needs of this
local marketplace is not through central control but by steering the
decisions and activities of its players through restructuring the
marketplace
o The government should
 Set the rules int eh market place
 Facilitate the provision of information
 Augment demand
 Catalyze private sector suppliers and new market sectors
 Create market institutions
 Risk sharing
 Regulate through the application of market-oriented incentives
o Problems associated with government service delivery programs
  Driven by constituents, not customers
 Look at your people as customers you have to please
 Driven by politics, not policy
 Do not use programs as a way to politick
 Create turf, which public agencies defend at all costs
 Create fragmented service delivery systems
 Not self-correcting
 Obsolete
 Rarely achieve the scale necessary to make a significant impact
 Commands instead of incentivizes