Public Service Reform
A Question of Liberty
This is a summary of Edmond Grace's article published in the Spring 2009 issue of Studies. The full text of this article can be ordered by clicking on "add to cart" button above. A PDF file of the article will be sent to you by email.
The class structures of monarchy and aristocracy are reflected in various forms of deference to rank; but a healthy democratic process engages directly the whole citizen body.
Through elections and parliament citizens are enabled to seek a remedy for grievance - but always provided that full personal liberty is the chief protagonist in the drama, that they are free to criticise the powerful robustly.
The sheer scale and complexity of modern government has, however, itself become a source of confusion and discouragement for citizens : a bewildering labyrinth of agencies, rules and regulations has rendered the decision-making process of government inaccessible; nor is there any apparent means of holding elected representatives or public servants to account. (In recent times, of course, the greatest source of tyranny in the Western world comes not from government, but from organised crime – a tyranny stemming not from intrusion , but from absence on the part of government, especially among marginalised groups).
Liberty must not be denied by the presence of restraints [John Locke]; but neither must it be denied by the absence of the resources (by, for instance, social inequality) needed for its exercise [John Stuart Mill]. Crucially, liberty requires solidarity to vindicate itself - the active participation of citizens in public affairs (that solidarity which itself relies on citizens’ reciprocal enjoyment of human respect and encouragement, termed by President John Adams ‘public happiness’).
Public administration in Ireland consciously set itself the task of reform with the 1994 Strategic Management Initiative (expanded in 1996 into Delivering Better Government). However, the choice here of the term ‘customer’ for the citizen was not the happiest. The reason is that a customer can choose not to be a customer : instead of buying this or that make of car, a citizen can decide to travel by bus or to cycle; but a citizen may not choose to opt out of citizenship and its obligations. The key insight required is : it is with fellow citizens that public servants are engaging. With this accepted, liberty can flourish in the form of candid expression of personal views. And this expression of liberty should next carry over to affect the bureaucratic ranks themselves. Without the resource opened up by such a culture of candid expression, it is hard to see how the state can ever unravel complex bureaucracies.
Edmond Grace, S.J., is Director of the Conversation on Democracy in Ireland
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