ASSEMBLY BEGINS RESUMED FIFTIETH SESSION TO CONSIDER PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION AND DEVELOPMENT
Press Release
GA/9057
ASSEMBLY BEGINS RESUMED FIFTIETH SESSION TO CONSIDER PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION AND DEVELOPMENT
19960415 Secretary-General Says All Nations Have To Rethink Issues Of Governance; Draft Resolution Recognizes Need To Optimize UN RoleThe General Assembly would recognize the need to optimize the United Nations role as a global centre of excellence for public administration and development and make it more responsive to public management issues relating to sustainable development, under a draft resolution introduced this morning, as the Assembly began its resumed session on the role of public administration in development.
The Assembly's resumed session, which ends on 19 April, has been called to consider the role of public administration in development, particularly in developing countries and countries with economies in transition. It represents the first time the Assembly has met specifically to consider this issue.
By other terms of the draft resolution, which was introduced by the Minister for Administrative Affairs of Morocco, the Assembly would recommend that machinery be established to ensure maximum coordination among activities of the United Nations programme in public administration and finance, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Bretton Woods institutions. Governments would be invited to enhance productivity, accountability and responsiveness of public institutions.
Addressing the opening session, Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali said that in the 1990s all nations were having to rethink critical issues of governance. States had received United Nations assistance for activities to enhance public institutions and administration. In many sectors, only the United Nations could demonstrate both the impartiality and the expertise necessary to help Member States achieve results.
Citing the importance of the United Nations efforts in the field of democratization, he stressed that creation of a truly responsive and effective public service required participatory decision-making. Democratization was often the single most important factor for improved public administration. It
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increased accountability and encouraged development of a professional, rather than a political, public administration. An enemy of corruption, inefficiency and poor management, it also provided incentives for maximum effectiveness in the delivery of goods and services.
Opening the session on behalf of Diogo Freitas Do Amaral (Portugal), Assembly President, the Permanent Representative of Lebanon said the 1990s had brought demanding challenges to public administration worldwide, and the phrase "doing more with less" had become a conviction. The United Nations, too, was undergoing reform, but remained committed to its founding principles. Part of the Organization's strength lay in its capacity to support the human and institutional environments within which the public sector, financial institutions and the private sector operate, while preserving a commitment to humanity.
Statements were also made by the Minister for Public Service, Regional and Institutional Affairs of Italy (for the European Union); Minister for State Reform, the Civil Service and Decentralization of France; Permanent Representative of the Netherlands; Chairman of the Civil Service Commission of the Philippines; Senior Policy Adviser to the Vice-President of the United States; and Director of the Civil Service of Bolivia.
The General Assembly will meet again at 3 p.m. today to continue its consideration of the role of public administration in development.
Assembly Work Programme
The General Assembly met in resumed session this morning to consider the role of public administration in development, particularly in developing countries and countries with economies in transition. The one-week resumed session represents the first time the Assembly is meeting specifically to consider that issue. (For background information, see Press Release GA/9056, of 12 April.)
Under the provisions of a draft resolution submitted by Morocco (document A/50/L.69), the Assembly would recommend that the appropriate machinery be established to ensure maximum coordination of activities among the United Nations programme in public administration and finance, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Bretton Woods institutions. It would also recommend that the Group of Experts on Public Administration and Finance should be designated as the United Nations committee on public administration and development.
The Assembly would recognize that challenges and trends facing the international community in the field of public administration and development include the need to further define the role of the United Nations as a global centre of excellence in that field and also the need to optimize that role to make it more responsive to emerging public management issues related to sustainable development.
Recognizing that public administration systems must be sound, efficient and well equipped with capacities and capabilities, the Assembly would acknowledge the need for Member States to strengthen their capacities for effective public administration to promote sustainable development and establish conditions for good governance, in which non-governmental organizations and the private sector could play a meaningful role.
The Assembly would emphasize the need for public administration to attain an enhanced and proactive role in national development strategies through, among others, the following factors: ensuring the rule of law; strengthening the capacity for policy development and financial management; promoting the efficient utilization of information technology; ensuring that delivery of services, by either the public or the private sector, is responsive, efficient and effective; and providing an enabling environment for the private sector.
Further, by the draft, governments would be invited to strengthen their public administrative and financial management capacities through reforms, emphasizing enhanced productivity, accountability and responsiveness of the public institutions.
The Assembly would acknowledge that the United Nations activities and programmes in public administration and development could best be responsive
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to Member States needs by, among others, providing advisory services and technical assistance in administrative restructuring to support economic liberalization and decentralization processes; contributing to the development of "management change" units in developing countries and countries with economies in transition; and assisting those countries in capacity-building for socio-economic development.
The Secretary-General would be requested to ensure that the United Nations system, particularly the UNDP and the Organization's programme in public administration and finance, carry out without duplication a series of activities, including the provision of advisory services to Member States on measures to strengthen public administration and public finance institutions, and strengthening regional centres to ensure the sharing of knowledge and experience and to promote South-South and interregional cooperation.
Statements
The Acting President of the General Assembly, SAMIR MOUBARAK (Leganon), said the Member States had resumed the fiftieth session of the Assembly to examine the important question of public administration and development at a time when reforming the public sector was a priority. The 1990s had brought an extraordinary and demanding set of challenges to public administration throughout the world. Out of necessity, the phrase "doing more with less" had become a conviction. Because reform was of such importance, Member States believed there was a need to review globally the experience of countries and identify sound practices in the planning and management of development.
The United Nations, too, he said, was undergoing a reform process and was faced with having to do more with less. But it remained committed to its founding principles. The strength of the Organization lay in its being an impartial global institution, and in its capacity for supporting the human and institutional environments within which the public sector, financial institutions and the private sector could operate effectively and efficiently, while still preserving, as Albert Einstein put it, "a wholehearted, indivisible commitment to humanity".
Secretary-General BOUTROS BOUTROS-GHALI, said that in the 1990s all nations, irrespective of their level of economic advancement or public development, were having to rethink critical issues of governance and purpose. Many were having to reassess fundamental aspects of the relationship between government and society itself.
Improving public administration systems had rightly been a special priority for the United Nations, he said. Member States had sought and received United Nations assistance for a wide range of activities intended to strengthen and enhance public institutions and public administration. In many sectors, only the United Nations could demonstrate both the impartiality and the expertise necessary to help Member States achieve results.
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He called Member States' attention to the importance of United Nations efforts in the field of democratization. The creation of a truly responsive and effective public service required participatory decision-making, which also was the core of the democratization process.
Democratization, he continued, was often the single most important factor for improved public administration. Democratization increased accountability. It encouraged development of a professional, rather than a political, public administration. It was the enemy of corruption, inefficiency and poor management, and it provided incentives for maximum effectiveness in the delivery of goods and services.
He said the results of the Assembly's deliberations would form an integral part of the overall change that would further define the United Nations and its role in the twenty-first century. The delegations' leadership was critical. The mandate devised during the coming days would ultimately determine the shape of the Organization's activities in support of public administration.
MESSAOUD MANSOURI, Minister for Administrative Affairs of Morocco, introducing the draft resolution, said public administrations, today more than ever before, had to provide a framework for economic and political reforms. All Member States needed to have an exchange with others so that they could better apply their own national programmes. Obstacles facing developing countries were similar, and so coordination between them was essential. It was also important to highlight the role of the United Nations as the prime mover in strengthening public administration and South-South cooperation.
GIOVANNI MOTZO, Minister for Public Service, Regional and Institutional Affairs of Italy, speaking also on behalf of the European Union, said the Assembly should recognize the existence of a set of principles on public administration and development. Consideration of possible institutional issues should be based on existing structures and avoid the creation of any new United Nations mechanism. The Assembly should recognize public administration and the strengthening of decision-making structures as one of the cross-cutting themes of all the recent major international conferences.
He said the role of the United Nations and other international organizations, to ensure the maintenance of essential basic government services and functions during crises and to develop strategies for countries undergoing post conflict rehabilitation and reconstruction, should be recognized. At the intergovernmental level, the main responsibility of the United Nations system should lie with the Economic and Social Council. The UNDP should play a leading role in United Nations activities. A careful assessment should be made at the intergovernmental and interagency level to ensure closer interaction and complementarity.
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During a meeting last March in Rome on the restoration of government administrative machinery, various strategies for rebuilding a viable public administration undergoing post-conflict rehabilitation and reconstruction were discussed, he said. The conclusions of the meeting included those on the primary importance of the role of governments; the increase of social trust through a predictable legal system; the development of a "culture of cooperation" with citizens to encourage tolerance; and the involvement of the international community. International interventions were most useful when they integrated with local development initiatives by building on what already existed, especially at the community level.
DOMINIQUE PERBEN, Minister for State Reform, the Civil Service and Decentralization of France, said the difficulty of reconciling social and financial demands through good governance was a challenge shared by all Member States. Developing countries, affected by their national debts and poverty, needed to find coherent and stable development.
The principles of equality, continuity, impartiality and the ability to adapt to change could be found, with some differences, in the majority of the world's countries, particularly within the European Union. Adapted to national requirement, they should form the basis of the discussion on the role of administration in development. Ambitious reform was taking place in France, in order to place the public at the centre of the State's endeavours, while making every effort to increase State efficiency.
NICOLAAS H. BIEGMAN (Netherlands) said that in its development cooperation his country was more and more focusing its attention on effective and measurable outputs. The objectives should be established by the recipient countries, which would also be expected to make a financial and physical contribution to the programme.
Public administration had a crucial role to play in providing basic social services, he said. According to UNDP calculations, $30 billion to $40 billion per year would be needed to provide basic social services throughout the world between now and the year 2010. Of that amount, 75 per cent could and must be raised by developing countries themselves.
He did not believe that the Department for Development Support and Management Services was the best-equipped institution to follow up on the work of the current resumed session of the General Assembly. He suggested instead that the Department for Economic and Social Information and Policy Analysis be given the leading role in the analytical and normative follow-up, and UNDP lead the operational follow-up.
CORAZON ALMA G. DE LEON, Chairman of the Civil Service Commission of the Philippines, said the economic success stories of Asia share one common factor: governments of countries in that region redirected their role from one of direct involvement in production to the functions of development,
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regulation and maintenance of an enabling framework. That shift required considerable reform in the administrative machinery. The substance, direction and pace of those reforms were the focus of the United Nations regional conference on the role of public administration in promoting economic development, held in Manila last March. Despite differences in legal systems, there was general agreement that laws governing administrative systems were too many or redundant. Their enforcement was slow, and some laws could not be implemented due to lack of resources, operational constraints or irrelevance to prevailing conditions.
She said the conference recommended the new governance paradigm deserved greater publication and dissemination. There was a shared recognition that countries could learn from each other's experiences in the areas of good governance and institution building. Multilateral and bilateral institutions, such as the United Nations and the Asian Development Bank, could provide the lead in developing and implementing programmes on good governance. It was also suggested that the United Nations should marshal its resources to help countries adopt good governance theories; pools of experts could be created to extend such services. There was a need to share information and for training. It was pointed out that the Asian Development Bank could provide resources in institutionalizing those programmes.
ELAINE KAMARCK, Senior Policy Adviser to the Vice-President of the United States, said that in the United States, as in other countries, difficult questions were being asked about the role of government. The size of the public service was being decreased and cost-effective ways of delivering servIces were being explored. Regulations were being simplified, and the burden of regulations on industry was being lessened.
In many countries, there was a growing recognition that, if governments did not work well, the economy would not work well, she said. The demand for more responsive governments was also based on a need for greater public responsiveness to the needs of the people, as well as for greater accountability. The great changes in information technology had accelerated the process. "Democracies must continually reinvent themselves if they are to respond to the changing needs and expectations of their citizens."
She said the American federal government employed nearly 2 million people at an annual budget of some $1.5 trillion. While that would not change overnight, there had been significant progress. The civil work force had been cut by 204,000, to the smallest level in over 30 years. That downsizing had been accomplished through attrition and by offering employees cash incentive to leave the government. In addition to downsizing, there had been savings of $58 billion, while "sensible ways" to save another $120 billion had been proposed.
"This Administration is slashing the regulatory and administrative burden of government on citizens and businesses by nearly $28 billion", she
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said. The budget deficit had been cut, and there was now a broad commitment to make government live within its means by balancing the federal budget.
GERARDO TEJERINO, Director of Civil Service of Bolivia, said his country had suffered a profound economic crisis during the 1980s; in September 1985, inflation had reached 27,000 per cent. In August of that year, he said, a radical change in economic policies included the reform and simplification of the tax system and a drastic reduction of the fiscal deficit. In essence, Bolivia had understood that its economy was essential to the further development of its democracy and the well-being of its population in general. Macroeconomic stability, however, was not enough, and several other measures were deemed necessary, such as the integration of government administration and management, known as the "Safco law". Its main goals were the development of the state of law and the elimination of corruption; the law of participation of the people, including indigenous, peasant and urban communities; educational reform; and the decentralization of public administration.
A main criticism was the lack of credibility of State institutions, he said. The Bolivian Civil Service hoped to bring concrete answers to that public perception. Through auditable processes, citizens would be informed of the reasons for hiring a public servant, the costs to the State and the person's effectiveness.
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