UNIT 1

PUBLIC SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT: CONCEPT,

NATURE, SCOPE AND CHARACTERISTICS

Structure

1.0

1.0

Learning Outcome

1.1

Introduction

1.2

Public Systems Management: Concept

1.3

Public Systems Management: Nature

1.4

Public Systems Management: Scope

1.5

Public Systems Management: Characteristics

1.6

Conclusion

1.7

Key Concepts

1.8

References and Further Reading

1.9

Activities

LEARNING OUTCOME

After studying this Unit, you should be able to:

Analyse the theoretical foundations of the evolution of the concept of public

systems management

Examine the nature and scope of public systems management; and

Highlight the characteristics of public systems management.

1.1

INTRODUCTION

Public administration both as a practice and a discipline is undergoing change in view

of contemporary global developments in the socio-economic arena.
The current
globalisation trends have led to a rethinking about the role of the State and
government. Approaches to public administration are also embedded in wider
conceptions of the State, the relationship between State, market and civil society. The
market model of governance has been emerging since 1980s. Public administrators
are now viewed by many as entrepreneurial managers whose job is to attain cost
effectiveness. They are expected to be more entrepreneurial and result-focused. In
this context, the concept of public systems has added a new dimension to the structure
and system of working of public administration. Public systems management is a
developing theme lending a new dimension to the discipline of public administration.
In this Unit, an attempt is made to explore the evolution, nature, scope and
characteristics of Public Systems Management (PSM).

1.2

PUBLIC SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT: CONCEPT

A system, according to Gore and Stubbe (1994), is a combination of resources

working together to convert inputs into outputs.
Every organisation comprises
systems with certain goals to fulfil, converting inputs into provision of goods and
services. For example, it can be personnel, finance, logistics, marketing systems and
so on. Public systems management, broadly speaking, comprises several sub-systems

operating in the public arena. Each of the sub-systems aims at achieving certain
prescribed goals through utilisation of resources - human, financial and material.
Public systems management operates within a broad framework of rules, regulations,
catering to the needs of the public and making use of public finance.
The public domain or system has certain distinct characteristics and functions to
discharge and operates within a prescribed framework. Hence it cannot totally accept
the private sector principles and styles of operation. As we have discussed,
globalisation over the past twenty years, had a significant impact on public systems.
The neo liberal views, public choice perspective have resulted in the roll back of the
State from key areas, and led to quasi markets, separation of policy from execution,
professional administration, etc. Public systems, still, function within the domain of
State, law, and politics and pursue the public interest. Attempts to equate business
and public administration, under the name of public management reform, signify
conservative mistakes of not distinguishing the different logics that govern the private
and public realms.
Public management reforms draw inspiration from business
management where decision-making autonomy is enjoyed by the managers of
companies. Nevertheless, the difference between public administration and business
administration, derived from the different nature of private and public organisations,
needs to be made clear. There are two basic differences. First, the business
organisation has definite owners and seeks profit, while the public organisation
belongs to everyone and pursues the public interest. Second, the private company is
governed or coordinated by the market, which falls within the scope of economic
theory, while the State particularly the democratic State goes by the logic of
democratic politics, which is analysed by political science and public law (Pereira,
2004, emphasis added).
Public systems management, it can be said is concerned with the designing and
operation of public services and the functioning of executive government. This sort of a
reform attempt of State bureaucracies seeks to make government more business like
providing a prominent role for bureaucrats as managers.
Public administration has always been entrusted with the major obligation of
promoting public interest assuring equity, representation and responsiveness to the
citizens. But its excessive reliance on bureaucracy, hierarchy, rules and regulations,
over time, raised significant questions of its efficacy and effectiveness.
Several
factors such as the collapse of the USSR, increasing levels of public expenditure and
taxation, dissatisfaction with the structure and functioning of bureaucracy, and the
impact of globalisation have given rise to management orientation in the operations of
the public systems.
In response there is now a paradigm shift in public administration tending to change the
nature and character of public systems. This reform process has four components. These
are:
i)

Privatisation and deregulation

ii)

Establishing market like mechanisms

iii)

Decentralisation, and

iv)

Debureaucratisation

All the above are intended to create competitive public systems premised on
managerialism. There is a global trend now to introduce a series of methods and
techniques in the governmental system. Public organisations have liberally borrowed
different approaches from private management. A historical perspective would reveal
that bureaucracies throughout the world have rarely responded effectively to
2

environmental challenges on their own. They have lagged behind the times. The
remedies to bureaucratic ailments have been offered more by scholars of
management. New Public Management is one such manifestation.
The classical
public administration based on Taylors Scientific Management and Weberian model
have emphasised on division of work, specialisation, rule orientation, impersonality,
rationality, neutrality and anonymity in public services. These models aimed at the
internality of the administrative system and ignored its externality. The rigidity of
models could not suit the dynamic societal changes. Further, the conventional model
of public organisation is theoretically rooted in the Wilsonian dichotomy of politics
and administration. The outcomes of this dichotomy include inefficient bureaucracy,
nexus between the trio-politicians, bureaucrats and pressure groups or covetous
interests, alienation of citizenry from administration and mounting financial burden of
administrative machinery on the State exchequer. Many studies have questioned the
responsiveness and efficacy of these models and their applicability to the present
globalised scenario. This led to the search for alternative models of public
administration. All this resulted in significant changes in the management of public
systems.
Broadly, these changes aim at the entrepreneurial role of public
organisations with a market orientation geared to effectiveness and economy in the
functioning of public systems. This new model of administration system is being
called new public management. We have already discussed in detail about this in
Courses 011 and 012 of this Programme.
The theoretical foundation for this change is provided by several interrelated strands of
literature mainly contributed by the new right, public choice approach, property rights
literature, the principal agent relationship and organisation and management orientation.
New Right Philosophy
The term New Right was first assigned to a group of monetarists from Chicago
University in 1970s. The new right school of thought propagated the idea of noninterference by the government in the economy as it created distortions in the market,
which produced adverse outcomes. It broadly maintains that State involvement leads
to increasing monopoly, expanding budgets and suppressing of entrepreneurial
behaviour, limiting choice, over production of unwanted services and encouragement
of waste and inefficiency. In view of this, the new right philosophy has forcefully
argued in favour of a reorientation of the State as regulator and producer. Therefore,
deregulation and privatisation are amongst the six - point reform agenda of the New
Right. The other measures are the reduction of inflation, lower taxation, increasing
role of the market in the provision of public services and institutional and
constitutional reforms. The aim of these reforms is to promote competition between
rival bureaucracies, reduce the influence of interest groups and corporatist institutions
and impose a constitutional upper limit on public expenditure as a proportion of the
gross national product.
The new right philosophy has always given predominance to the values of individual
rights and choice. The protagonists of this school assigned a key role to the market in
creation of economic wealth and employment.
Public Choice Approach
The proponents of public choice approach hold the bureaucracy responsible for the
declining quality of public services. A basic argument of this approach is that an
individual manager or a client is a utility maximiser who is always in search of
increasing net benefits. This approach questions the three major orientations to the
study of public administration, viz., Wilsonian politics - administration dichotomy,
3

Weberian bureaucracy and Herbert Simons rationalist decision-making model.

broad terms, the policy recommendations of the public choice approach are to:
i)

Minimise the role of the State

ii)

Limit the discretionary power of politicians

iii)

Reduce public monopolies to a minimum, and

iv)

Curb the functions of government agencies.

In

The impact of public choice approach has been very significant on the scope of
governmental activities. For example, the public choice theorists express doubts about the
very basis of government. The central role of the State is being questioned. Marketlike processes will take away the monopoly of decision-making authority from the
hands of civil servants. The decentralised market-like arrangement is posited as an
alternative to a coercive and ineffective bureaucratic hierarchy. An important
organisational assumption in public choice approach is the desirability of
decentralisation, democratic administration and organisational competitiveness.
According to Buchanan and Tullock, decentralisation creates opportunity for the
promotion of competition among governmental agencies, and in the process the
individual citizens choice increases.
The public choice approach has helped develop a new framework for governmental
functioning. This approach has laid the basis for a new administrative framework,
which has strongly favoured reinventing the governmental functioning according to the
market concepts of competition and efficiency.
Property Rights Theory
Property rights theory provides a way of understanding the incentives for performance
that exist in private sector and examining whether they can be introduced in the public
sector. The owners do not have absolute control over the assets, and there are many
others who have right over the revenues which include managers, employees etc.
Hence there is incentive for performance, which is lacking in public sector.
The property rights literature reveals that property rights are not neutral. Variations in these
arrangements have a far- reaching impact on the behaviour of employees and thus on
performance. According to Dunsire, the central argument is that private sector
organisations in which right to profit are clearly defined will perform better than those in
the public sector where rights are diffused and uncertain. Privatisation, which entails
changes in property rights in favour of private ownership, is thus considered
beneficial for the promotion of efficiency.
Principal-Agent Theory
Changes in property rights transform the relationship between the owner of the firm or
organisation and management. In order to explain this phenomenon, the proponents of
privatisation rely upon principal-agent theory in which owner is the principal and
management is the agent. According to this approach, the principal and the agent
follow different objectives. The principal desires, that the agent should act towards
fulfilment of his goals. The principal however is not fully equipped with the
information concerning actions and behaviour of the agent.
The principal-agent theory is based on contract as the basis of social and political life.
The agent agrees to perform tasks on behalf of the principal and in return, the
principal agrees to reward the agent on mutually acceptable manner. Contracting is
resorted to by the principal, as, the jobs to be performed require specialised
knowledge, expertise and skills. Agents in a contractual relationship, take decisions

that affect the principal and act in ways that contribute to fulfilment of principals
objectives in a maximum manner.
Organisation and Management Literature
The focus of organisation and management literature, providing a critique of the
Weberian model of bureaucracy is the internal structure of the organisations. This
literature promotes the culture of adoption of private sector practices in the public
sector particularly in fast changing and hostile environment.
Most of the countries have made structural adjustments in their public systems to limit the
role of the State, including downsizing bureaucracy, devolution of authority, cost
reduction, contracting out some of the operative functions of government, developing and
designing result - oriented appraisal system and commercialisation as well as market
orientation of the governmental activities. The argument is that more market does not
mean less government, but different government. The administration is apparently
moving from rule to result orientation, from systems to enterprise, obedience to
reward, inaction to action, centralisation to decentralisation and from the duties of
administrators to the rights of citizens. Contemporary reforms are reorienting governance
towards management philosophy. This management perspective explains the crux of the
Public Systems Management.
Its three core central tendencies have been identified by some authors as under:

Organisational restructuring in order to shift emphasis from centralised

administration to decentralised management through the creation of
autonomous and semi-autonomous agencies and the devolution of resources and
operational decision making to front line managers

Increasing use of market type mechanisms such as charging for services,

privatisation and contracting out, whilst regulating providers and making
services responsive to users/customers

Increasing emphasis on performance-an attempt to shift the methods of doing

business in the public sector away from merely complying with procedural
rules towards getting results (Batley and Larbi, 2004).

1.3

PUBLIC SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT: NATURE

Over the years, different forms of political and administrative systems and methods of
governance have been focusing on the ways to reconcile the interests of the citizens
with that of the role of the State. The emergence of the concept of public systems
management in public administration has added a new dimension to the whole issue
of governance. Public systems management has been considered by many as
administration and management of both direct and indirect institutions engaged in
the public policy making exercise and in delivery of public services. It is a style of
management, which emphasises output targets, limited term contracts, monetary
incentives and freedom to manage. The focus of the PSM is on results, efficiency and
measurement. It brings the following changes in the functioning of public
organisations viz.
i)

There is a greater flexibility in tailoring the organisation to circumstance,

instead of necessarily following a rigid Weberian model

ii)

The focus is on results

iii)

Greater attention is paid to strategic planning

iv)

Private sector personnel practices have been adopted such as paying more for
good performance or less for poor performance.

PSM propagates managerial pursuits in governance, with a focus upon the following:

Steering role of the government instead of direct provision

Concern on results and outcomes

Orientation to the needs of customers, and

Use of market mechanisms in those activities of public sector which cannot be

privatised.

In public systems management, the unique aspect is the public domain or the
publicness. Ranson and Stewart (1994), insist on the uniqueness of public domain,
which, they do not doubt, cannot be reduced to the principles of private
administration. As they observe in the public domain any notion of management
which cannot encompass the recognition of politics and conflict as constitutive of a
public organisation rather than as an obstacle to it is barren.
PSM offers a more pragmatic approach to achieve the goals of public organisation.
Public system managers are to become entrepreneurs and develop innovative ways of
supplying government provision through the bureaucracy and providing services
through other means involving the private sector. This could be more creative and
dynamic. Modern governments are giving importance to managerialism to provide
efficient services to people at the lowest administrative costs. Managerialism does
not mean usurping of government by technocrats, a reduction in accountability or a
diminution of democracy. Instead, managerialism allows the government to provide
public services in a more efficient and cost-effective way. It also provides more
information to the managers to take better policy decisions. PSM attempts to be
people-sensitive, efficient and cost effective in delivering public services. It has both
ethical consistency and organisational flexibility to remain faithful to the achievement
of the goals of public service.

1.4

PUBLIC SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT: SCOPE

Contemporary governments are attempting to be performance-oriented. Therefore,

management of government needs to be deregulated. The nature of public agencies must
be entrepreneurial, mission-driven, and service-oriented. Public systems managers
are to be risk-takers who invite participation of other kindred organisations for partnering
and reward performance. In this scenario, the scope of public systems management is
confined to following areas of governance:

Focusing on achieving results rather than primarily conforming with processes

Introducing market principles such as competition, contracting out in the

provision of goods and services

Making public administration customer-driven to enhance service ethic and

efficiency

Assigning the role of steering activities to the government rather than rowing,
relying on third parties such as non-profit organisations, other levels of
government in implementation of policies

Deregulating the government activities to make it result-oriented

6

Empowering the employees to serve the customers as it promotes teamwork

Changing the overall public administrative culture towards flexibility,

innovation, entrepreneurialism, as opposed to rule-bound, process orientation and
focusing on inputs rather than results; and

A new entrepreneurial, user-oriented culture is being created in public systems,

with emphasis on performance measurement, autonomy to organisation and
freedom to individuals.

Kettle (2002), points out certain basic concerns that the New Public Management
initiatives address. These include:
Productivity
How can governments produce more services with less tax money?
Marketisation
How can governments use market - style incentives to root out the pathologies of
government bureaucracy?
Service orientation
How can governments better connect with citizens to make programmes more
responsive to the needs of the citizen?
Decentralisation
How can governments make programmes more responsive and effective by shifting
programmes to lower levels of government or shifting responsibility within public
agencies to give front line managers greater incentive and ability to respond to the needs
of citizens?
Policy
How can governments improve capacity to devise and track policy?
Accountability for results
How can governments improve their ability to deliver what they promise?
PSM is intended to realise the above concerns in practice. Its scope is to project
customer choice as the public choice through enhancing the effectiveness of public
services based on many of the private sector principles and practices. The focus is
more towards achieving managerial decentralisation of governance, performance and
results orientation, and citizens/consumers satisfaction.

1.5

PUBLIC SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT: CHARACTERISTICS

Public Systems Management advocates increasing managerial autonomy by reducing

central agency control in governance. It recognises the importance of providing the
human and technological resources that managers need, to achieve their performance
targets. The important characteristic of PSM is that responsibility is taken by
managers for the achievement of results. Under this, the relationship between
politician and manager is more fluid and is closer than before. It does not disown the
essential political character of government but, at the same time, would claim a
degree of autonomy in terms of both input handling and results production. Another
important characteristic feature is recognition of the need for direct accountability of
the manager
to the public or the consumer. There is thus a client focus and greater
responsiveness to outside groups and individuals in public systems management. It
has the following characteristics that tend to mend the traditional ways of organising
7

government:
i)

It is concerned with the delivery of high quality services that citizens value.

ii)

It considers citizens as active consumers and serious attempts are made to

find out their expectations and needs.

iii)

It provides greater flexibility in working conditions such as contractual

appointments, work place bargaining etc and is permitted to make use of more
expertise and employee creativity.

iv)

It creates conditions for more positive and productive managerial leadership.

To create such conditions, it simplifies organisational structures and flattens
hierarchies.

v)

It develops rigorous performance measurement of individuals and

organisations.

vi)

It is receptive to competition and adopts an open minded attitude

management of public organisations.

vii)

It adopts collaborative and net-working approach to work with public, private,

voluntary sectors in solving community problems and providing public
services.

viii)

It advocates decentralisation of authority embracing participatory management

model.

ix)

It prefers market mechanisms to bureaucratic mechanisms.

x)

It takes steps to prevent administrative problems rather than cure them after
they arise.

towards

Public systems management is characterised by new State institutions, administrative

culture and management strategies. It does not undermine the importance of State
bureaucracy. On the contrary, it assigns an important strategic role to it. The public
systems are characterised by :
High levels of transparency, accountability instead of mere adherence to procedures,
rules, etc.
Extensive use of information technology for all operations.
Decentralisation of activities, contracting, outsourcing with State exercising control
over strategic areas.
A new role assigned to civil servants, exercising technical competence, managerial
skills along with policy making capacities.
A new work culture in public systems and organisations with incentive systems,
performance evaluation, pay differentials etc.
In brief, PSM adopts explicit market orientation and relies on private sector practices.
PSM seeks to blend managerial pragmatism and political conviction. It promises
professionalism, impartiality, high ethical standards, and the reduction of corruption
along with improved performance.

1.6

CONCLUSION

Remarkable changes have taken place in the 80s and the 90s as governments in the
Western developed countries sought to adapt themselves to new technology, new
8

societal demands and keen competition. This has led to a search for a new kind of
orientation in public administration permeating all its systems and sub-systems. Rigid,
rule-bound and hierarchic public administration does not suit the needs of a dynamic
situation demanding speedy action. In this perspective, many of the flexible
organisational designs and practices pioneered by the private sector have been
introduced in the public system with suitable modifications. Public systems
management today is thus being refashioned to underemphasise the traditional
Weberian rule-boundedness and the focus is now more on results and cost
effectiveness.
PSM considers citizens as active consumers and adopts collaborative approach to
work with public, private and civil society organisations in solving community
problems and providing public services. In fine, PSM seeks to make public service
delivery efficient, effective and economical with the adoption of many of the
management concepts and techniques of the private sector.

1.7

KEY CONCEPTS

Civil Society
It refers to self organisation of citizens. It is the collective of social organisations,
which enjoy autonomy from the state and pursue special interests. Civil society
includes network of groups that include financial, private, charitable, social service,
development and professional organisations.
Debureaucratisation
It implies reducing the bureaucratism prevalent in organisations. It is done through
removal of monopolies, reducing the exercise of power and authority from a few
bureaucrats or politicians in government. This is also achieved through promotion of
participation of various forms of citizens organisations in the countrys governance.
Deregulation
It is the process of lessening the monopolies of few in any sector of the economy by
opening those sectors to other players also. The reforms ushered in India since 1990s,
has thrown open certain sectors of the economy such as banking, telecommunications,
civil aviation etc. to competition to provide better service at lower prices and greater
choice. These sectors have been given more autonomy free from stringent rules and
regulations.
Neo-liberalism
This thinking gained prominence from mid 1950s in Britain. which advocated free
market. It gave significance to supremacy of market mechanisms, maximisation of
individual liberty and freedom, roll back of State. It propagated diminishing the role of
welfare State as it was said to affect the potential of free market.
Property Rights Theory
It offers a way of understanding the way incentives for performance function in
private sector. According to this, in an organisation, owners do not have complete
control of their assets, as employees, creditors etc. also contribute to the firms
functioning. They also have certain rights especially a certain amount of revenue from the
companys assets. Hence mangers, employees, have share in the profits of the company
or enterprises in the form of bonus, increase in pay etc. Hence, incentives play a key role
in enhancing the performance of company.
9

1.8

REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING

Arora, Ramesh K, (Ed), 2001, Management in Government: Concerns and

Priorities, Aalekh Publishers, Jaipur.
Arora, Ramesh, K, (Ed) 2004, Public Administration: Fresh Perspectives,
Aalekh Publishers, Jaipur.
Batley, Richard, and George Larbi, 2004,The Changing Role of Government
The
Reforms of Public Services in Developing Countries, Macmillan, Palgrave,
England
Bhattacharya, Mohit, 1991, Restructuring Public Administration: Essays in
Rehabilitation, Jawahar Publishers and Distributors, New Delhi.
Bhattacharya, Mohit, 2001, New Horizons of Public Administration, Jawahar
Publishers and Distributors, New Delhi.
Bowman, James, S, etal, 2004, The Professional Edge: Competencies in
Public Services, Prentice-Hall of India Private Limited, New Delhi.
Chakrabarty, Bidyut and Mohit Bhattacharya (Eds), 2003, Public Administration: A
Reader, Oxford University Press, New Delhi.
Dhameja, Alka, (Ed.), 2003, Contemporary Debates in Public Administration,
Prentice-Hall of India Private Limited, New Delhi.
Ghuman, B.S, 1998, Globalization, Liberalization, Privatisation: Impact on
Governance, A Theme Paper of Panel-III, Submitted to Third Annual Conference of New
Public Administration Society of India held at Department of Public
Administration, Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Open University, Hyderabad, July 3-4.
Ghuman, B.S, 2001, New Public Management: Theory and Practice, Indian Journal of
Public Administration, Vol. XLVII, No. 4, October-December.
Gore, M and J. Stubbe, 1994, Contemporary Systems Analysis (5th Ed), Business
and Educational Technologies, Dubuque, IOWA.
Huges, Owen, E, 1994, Public Management and Administration- An
Introduction, St. Martins Press Inc, New York.
The Indian Journal of Public Administration, 1998, Special Number on
Towards Good Governance, New Delhi, Vol. XLII, No.3, July-September.
The Indian Journal of Public Administration, 2004, Special Number on
Governance for Development, New Delhi, Vol. L, No.1, January - March.
Osborne, Stephen P, (Ed), 2002, Public Management: Critical Perspectives,
Routledge, London.
Periera Luiz Carlos - Bresser, 2004, Democracy and Public Management
Reform Building the Republican State, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Sahni, Pardeep and Uma Medury (Eds), 2003, Governance for Development:
Issues and Strategies, Prentice-Hall of India Private Limited, New Delhi.
Vayunandan, E, and Dolly Mathew (Eds), 2003, Good Governance: Initiatives
in India, Prentice-Hall of India Private Limited, New Delhi.

1.9 ACTIVITIES
1.

Prepare a brief note explaining the changes that have taken place in the west
during 1980s and their impact on the discipline of public administration.

2.

Write a note on structural adjustment initiatives undertaken in any one of the

countries of Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development
(OECD) or any developing country and assess their influence over its
administrative system.

10

11