ROLE OF CIVIL SERVICE IN DEVELOPING SOCIETIES

Personnel administration is an important aspect of public administration in the modern state. Herman Finer rightly observes, “Personnel is the sovereign factor in public administration.”
Personnel administration is also called ‘manpower management’, ‘personnel management’, ‘labour welfare management’, and so on. However, the term ‘personnel administration’ has a wider connotation. It deals with classification, recruitment, training, promotion, compensation, discipline, and retirement benefits of the personnel in the government.

Meaning

The following statements bring out the meaning of civil service.
British Tomlin Commission (1929–31): “Civil service includes those servants of the crown (not being the holders of political or judicial offices) who are employed in a civil capacity and whose remuneration is wholly and directly paid out of the monies voted by the parliament.”
Encyclopedia of Britannica: “Civil service is a body of professional, full-time officials employed in the civil affairs of a state in a non-political capacity.”
Herman Finer: “Civil service is a professional body of officials, permanent, paid and skilled.”
E.N. Gladden: “The requirements of the civil service are that it shall be impartially selected, administratively competent, politically neutral, and imbibed with the spirit of service to the community.”

Features

Features of the civil services are as follows:
(i) It does not include persons of military service, judicial service and police service.
(ii) It also does not include those who hold political offices or work for the state without pay (in an honorary capacity).
(iii) It is a body of professional administrators as opposed to amateur politicians.
(iv) Impartial selection, i.e., members are appointed by open competition as against politicians who are elected on party lines.
(v) They are regularly paid by the state and do not work for private profit.
(vi) It is a career service, where members take up public service as a lifetime occupation.
(vii) Members are skilled experts due to continuous training and work experience.
(viii) It is organised on the principle of hierarchy, with a chain of command stretching in a pyramid fashion.
(ix) Neutrality, i.e., serving different political regimes impartially.
(x) Anonymity, i.e., working without praise or blame.

Role in Developing Societies

The civil service in a developing society like India plays a very important role. Its functions include:

• Policy Implementation: Execution of laws and policies to attain the goals of the welfare state such as social equity and economic development (as per Directive Principles of State Policy in India).

• Policy Formulation: Although the political executive decides policy, civil servants aid and advise ministers with information and expert advice.

• Delegated Legislation: Also called executive legislation or subordinate legislation. Civil servants make rules and regulations within the limits of the parent law.

• Administrative Adjudication: A quasi-judicial function where civil servants settle disputes between citizens and the state through Administrative Tribunals (e.g., Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, Industrial Tribunals, Rent Tribunals, Railway Rates Tribunals).

Additional functions:
(i) Administrative planning
(ii) Administration of public enterprises
(iii) Assisting ministers in fulfilling responsibilities towards parliament and committees
(iv) Financial operations of the state
(v) Reforming administration through O & M (Organisation and Methods)
(vi) Public relations

Types of Bureaucracy

F.M. Marx in The Administrative State classified bureaucracy into four types:

• Guardian Bureaucracy: Civil servants as guardians of justice and welfare. Selected by education and training in right conduct. Examples: Ancient Chinese bureaucracy (till Sung period, 960 A.D.) and Prussian bureaucracy (1640–1740 A.D.). Tended to become traditionalistic, conservative, ceremonial.

• Caste Bureaucracy: Based on class/caste connections. Example: In ancient India, only Brahmins and Kshatriyas were appointed. Similarly, British Civil Service was dominated by graduates of Oxford and Cambridge (aristocratic class). Also known as Aristocratic Personnel System.

• Patronage Bureaucracy: Recruitment based on personal favour or political reward, also called the ‘spoils system’. Traditional home: USA, and earlier England (till mid-19th century).

• Merit Bureaucracy: Most prevalent system today, based on merit alone. Recruitment through open competitive examinations, with no personal debt to any patron.

Elements of merit system:

• Recruitment by open competition

• Life tenure of office (good behaviour)

• In-service training

• Position classification

• Rational pay and allowances

• Promotion based on merit

• Retirement programmes

Merle Fainsod’s Classification of Bureaucracies in Developing Countries

1. Representative Bureaucracies: Found in competitive political processes, responsive to political forces supported by the electorate.

2. Party-State Bureaucracies: By-products of totalitarian regimes or one-party systems, where state bureaucracy is dominated by party bureaucracy.

3. Military-Dominated Bureaucracies: Exist where armed forces hold strategic power and place representatives in civilian posts.

4. Ruler-Dominated Bureaucracies: Found in autocratic regimes, where bureaucracy is the instrument of rulers/dictators to impose control.

5. Ruling Bureaucracies: Seen in colonial rule, where bureaucracy itself is the de-facto ruling element, holding decision-making power in political and administrative matters.

Evils of Bureaucracy

The role and power of bureaucracy have enormously increased in modern states with a welfare orientation. It now plays a significant part in the legislative and judicial spheres, in addition to its traditional administrative role. This concentration of powers has drawn severe criticism from eminent thinkers.

Lord Hewart: A renowned British jurist, he criticised the assumption of delegated legislation and administrative adjudication functions by the civil service. He argued that such concentration of power in bureaucracy threatens the liberties of citizens, calling it a ‘New Despotism’.

C.K. Allen: He described the growth of delegated legislation as the ‘Triumph of Bureaucracy’, as it makes the bureaucracy excessively powerful.

H.J. Laski: Like Hewart, he opposed the concentration of power in bureaucracy, arguing that it overrides the rights of the people. He defined bureaucracy as, “a system of government, the control of which is so completely in the hands of officials that their power jeopardises the liberties of ordinary citizens.”

Ramsay Muir: In his book How Britain is Governed, he criticised the growing dominance of civil servants. He observed: “In our system of government, the power of bureaucracy is enormously strong, whether in administration, in legislation or in finance. Under the cloak of democracy, it has thriven and grown until, like Frankenstein’s Monster, it sometimes seems likely to devour its creator… Bureaucracy thrives under the cloak of ministerial responsibility… it is ruinous when it becomes the master.”

Parkinson: In 1955, he propounded Parkinson’s Law, also called the ‘Rising Pyramid of Bureaucrats’. It states that the increase in number and size of the civil service is not related to the volume of work. Bureaucracy is self-perpetuating, as officials tend to create work for each other, thereby multiplying tasks and generating new jobs unnecessarily.

However, bureaucracy also has a positive dimension. It has made public administration more efficient, specialised, rational, predictable, and impersonal. As William Beveridge rightly stated, “Democracy if it knows its business, has no reason to fear bureaucracy.” Similarly, Herbert Morrison remarked, “Bureaucracy is the price of parliamentary democracy.”