SUMMARY

The Demand-side of Public Service Delivery and the Strengthening of a New Malaysia

This summary is about the case study which talks about the citizen’s desire for better
governance played a central role in shaping public opinion and influencing voter sentiment.
The governance deficit is not just about high-profile corruption scandals but about increasing
anxiety over perceived weakness economy and continued decline in
public service performance quality.

The lack of accountability to public sector to the people and its impact on the delivery of
public services has received less attention although it is an important component ongoing
debate in Malaysia. In this policy note they provides a framework for understanding the
changing landscape of public administration in Malaysia and suggests that it is time to
rebalance its focus from the supply side to the public demand side delivery service.

Malaysia's impressive record in fighting povertyand transformed its agrarian economy into an
industrialized middle-income country since its founding in 1957 has been well documented.4
This achieved by dependent developing countries on sound macroeconomic planning and the
deployment of effective institutions to build human capacity, provide critical infrastructure
and attract the private sector investment to drive economic growth. This achievement is even
more impressive when we consider affirmative action policies that were initiated during the
same period to correct long-standing ethnic differences in economic status.

These reform programs have attracted much interest recognition and international
recognition. However, the service delivery performance has continues to fall short of people's
expectations. The major investment in reform programs appears to be in place
failed to yield positive returns in public satisfaction. There were complaints received by the
Public Complaints Bureau about local authorities and public amenities. There remained a
persistent perception that the delivery system was not listening to citizen’s concerns, and that
Government decisions felt at the local level were not being made with public interest at heart.

Three major changes happened to challenge this paradigm which is the Centripetal Decision-
Making. These centripetal forces have been shaped not by objective developmental
imperatives, but by the modalities of power driven by the political economy of interest
groups. Secondly, change in Social Structure which relates to the profound transformation of
society in both urban and rural spaces. Lastly, change in the nature of the citizen which
change to affect the supply-driven paradigm is the change in the outlook and nature of urban
Malaysians.

The craft of public administration requires balance between the supply and delivery of
services and the dynamics of demand and the interests of the people. In case Malaysia, the
system has become very skewed and rooted in highly centralized supply-driven a paradigm
that fails to adapt to the changing social and economic landscape. This is unlike many other
middle- and high-income countries, where the principle of subsidiarity is well established in
the governance framework.

There are three key governance principles that are weakly represented in the current service
delivery system. Firstly. In an aspect of responsiveness to ensure that government does the
right thing by delivering services that solve citizen’s problems and which are consistent with
citizen priorities. Secondly, responsibility which ensure that government activities are done
correctly, fiscal resources managed prudently, and activities produce the intended impact.
Lastly the accountability in which to ensure that government is accountable to appropriate
safeguards to ensure that it serves the public interest with integrity.

This extreme emphasis on bureaucratic service delivery needs to be balanced with an

increased focus on the "demand side" which includes the needs, aspirations, opinions and
interests of ordinary people. Two mutually interdependent reforms need to be done which
help in increasing devolution of powers to elected local governments, and systems of
participatory planning which give citizens the ability to plan, demand and monitor the work
of government officials at the local level.

New type involvement that coordinates the state, the private sector and civil society needs to
be formed in the emerging New Malaysia. The basis of this reconfiguration is the role of
local governance in providing public services that match the needs of the people.