Research
You will find a complete range of our monographs, muti-authored and edited works including peer-reviewed, original scholarly research across the social sciences and aligned disciplines. We publish long and short form research and you can browse the complete Bristol University Press and Policy Press archive.
Policy Press also publishes policy reviews and polemic work which aim to challenge policy and practice in certain fields. These books have a practitioner in mind and are practical, accessible in style, as well as being academically sound and referenced.
Books: Research
Civil Servants and Globalization brings together insights on how globalization influences senior civil servants, with a focus on MENA countries. This book builds a typology of civil servants’ responses to globalization: traditional, professional, engaged, and rebel types of civil servants. The response model proposed by the authors uses bureaucratic accountability and socialization as two critical parameters. The approach is tested on three dimensions of globalization – the global push for performance, engagement through development support, and global open government movement – in four focus countries from the MENA region – Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, and Tunisia. Based on new data gathered through vignette techniques and in-depth interviews with senior civil servants, this book offers new insights on how globalization affects civil servants and what factors determine, enhance, or reduce its impact. Among the key findings are the following: First, civil servants across countries have become more professional and are more likely to utilize evidence-based approaches to persuade politicians to safeguard national interest. The emphasis on performance and accountability (via international performance indicator systems) is a disrupter of and accelerator towards performance management and evidence-based policy making, leading to the emergence of the engaged and, in some cases, rebel types of civil servant. Second, deepened direct engagement with international actors contributes to the socialization of international norms, and contributes to a shift towards civil service professionalization. Finally, there is overall agreement on values associated with indices across the countries, though less so with transparency and participation. Thus, while the global movement towards open government has the strong potential to influence civil servants and civil service systems, a shift towards the internalization of more inclusive and transparent decision making has not yet occurred in the countries under review. On this aspect, a more traditional response type continues to predominate.
This volume analyses the impact of globalization on civil service systems across the Middle East and North Africa.
A collaboration between practitioners and academic public policy experts, it presents an analytical model to assess how globalization influences civil servants, illustrated by case studies of countries where there has been an increased engagement with international actors. It demonstrates how this increased interaction has altered the position of civil servants and traces the shifting patterns of power and accountability between civil servants, politicians and other actors.
It is an original and important addition to debate about globalization’s role in transnational public administration and governance.
Civil Servants and Globalization brings together insights on how globalization influences senior civil servants, with a focus on MENA countries. This book builds a typology of civil servants’ responses to globalization: traditional, professional, engaged, and rebel types of civil servants. The response model proposed by the authors uses bureaucratic accountability and socialization as two critical parameters. The approach is tested on three dimensions of globalization – the global push for performance, engagement through development support, and global open government movement – in four focus countries from the MENA region – Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, and Tunisia. Based on new data gathered through vignette techniques and in-depth interviews with senior civil servants, this book offers new insights on how globalization affects civil servants and what factors determine, enhance, or reduce its impact. Among the key findings are the following: First, civil servants across countries have become more professional and are more likely to utilize evidence-based approaches to persuade politicians to safeguard national interest. The emphasis on performance and accountability (via international performance indicator systems) is a disrupter of and accelerator towards performance management and evidence-based policy making, leading to the emergence of the engaged and, in some cases, rebel types of civil servant. Second, deepened direct engagement with international actors contributes to the socialization of international norms, and contributes to a shift towards civil service professionalization. Finally, there is overall agreement on values associated with indices across the countries, though less so with transparency and participation. Thus, while the global movement towards open government has the strong potential to influence civil servants and civil service systems, a shift towards the internalization of more inclusive and transparent decision making has not yet occurred in the countries under review. On this aspect, a more traditional response type continues to predominate.
Civil Servants and Globalization brings together insights on how globalization influences senior civil servants, with a focus on MENA countries. This book builds a typology of civil servants’ responses to globalization: traditional, professional, engaged, and rebel types of civil servants. The response model proposed by the authors uses bureaucratic accountability and socialization as two critical parameters. The approach is tested on three dimensions of globalization – the global push for performance, engagement through development support, and global open government movement – in four focus countries from the MENA region – Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, and Tunisia. Based on new data gathered through vignette techniques and in-depth interviews with senior civil servants, this book offers new insights on how globalization affects civil servants and what factors determine, enhance, or reduce its impact. Among the key findings are the following: First, civil servants across countries have become more professional and are more likely to utilize evidence-based approaches to persuade politicians to safeguard national interest. The emphasis on performance and accountability (via international performance indicator systems) is a disrupter of and accelerator towards performance management and evidence-based policy making, leading to the emergence of the engaged and, in some cases, rebel types of civil servant. Second, deepened direct engagement with international actors contributes to the socialization of international norms, and contributes to a shift towards civil service professionalization. Finally, there is overall agreement on values associated with indices across the countries, though less so with transparency and participation. Thus, while the global movement towards open government has the strong potential to influence civil servants and civil service systems, a shift towards the internalization of more inclusive and transparent decision making has not yet occurred in the countries under review. On this aspect, a more traditional response type continues to predominate.
The theme of this chapter is the deepening engagement between international institutions and the countries of the MENA region, and whether and how this translates to growing socialization of international norms and principles among civil servants. Using a blend of vignettes and traditional interviews, the impact on the process of professionalization of civil servants was also examined. Deepening direct engagement with international actors influences civil servants and contributes to their professionalization. The broadened and deepened contacts between civil servants and international actors hence have a visible impact. However, while civil servants strongly value these direct relations, they remain loyal to national systems and institutions, especially when it comes to decisions that concern the internal management of their institutions. On this dimension of globalization, we therefore see evidence of greater professionalization (moving from the traditional to the professional civil servant), but limited indications that this will lead to civil servants allying with global actors to drive reforms and change.
The first dimension of globalization discussed is the global push for performance, which is driven by rankings and ratings on global performance indicators related to economic governance. The chapter examines, through a vignette-based research method, how civil servants respond to global performance pressures. The response typology set out in Chapter 1 was tested in this way on this first critical dimension of globalization. The review of evidence emerging from the literature and from in-depth interviews with senior officials shows a general adherence to the principle of performance and competition (on global indicators), and a growing interest in evidence-based policy making among civil servants. Improved performance on global indicators is associated with the public and national interest. On this basis, a more professional and engaged civil service type is emerging in most of the focus countries, and in some cases, rebel behaviour is also observed.
The concluding chapter focuses on adjusting, deepening, and finalizing the typology of civil servants proposed at the book’s outset, based on the evidence gathered from the analysis of the influence of three dimensions of globalization. Findings on the relevance and nature of filters, along with the relative importance of globalization transmission channels, are presented. The experience gained using an innovative methodological framework is also reviewed. Globalization, in the three dimensions reviewed here, has an impact on civil servants’ values and behaviours. However, civil servants’ association to global values is more evident than any real shifts in their behaviour. The potential for globalization’s greater influence is visible, becoming apparent mostly in the discussion on the global drive to performance, and least on the open government movement, although the latter has the strongest potential to generate change. The in-depth interviews, using a blend of vignettes and traditional methods, helped to confirm and deepen the response typology proposed at the start of the book, as well as fine tune the discussion on how global influences are filtered by national systems.
A review of the literature on the impact of global norms and principles on national governance systems shows the limited attention given to the role of civil servants in the interaction between global actors and nation states. To allow for a deeper analysis of this important research topic, this chapter sets out a new analytical framework and typology of how civil servants respond to global influence. Based on a review of academic research on the drivers of civil servants’ responses to external influence, the model focuses on two key parameters: bureaucratic accountability and socialization. Based on these parameters, four response types are expected to emerge: the traditional, professional, engaged, and rebel civil servant. The chapter also discusses transmission channels (global performance indicators, direct engagement with international actors, and global norms on freedom of information and participation) and institutional and behavioural filters of global influence. Finally, it lays out and discusses the research methodology used in the study on which this book is based, with particular attention given to the design and use of explorative vignettes as an innovative research method.
This chapter discusses the economic development models and economic history of the MENA region and four focus countries (Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, and Tunisia), the changing pattern of relations of MENA countries with international actors, and, in that context, the evolution of their civil service systems. On the first two points, sequential patterns of strong engagement and integration and isolation and self-reliance can be observed, with the last two decades showing a strong trend of re-engagement of MENA countries in the global economy and with international actors. Civil service systems, however, have not yet followed suit, and a disconnect between reintegration in the global economy and relatively unchanged civil service systems appears to emerge. The in-depth analysis on the influence of globalization on civil servants in the remaining part of the book will shed more light on these dynamics, as well as on the extent to which a more professional and engaged civil servant type is starting to emerge.
The global open government movement is the most recent new dimension of globalization that influences national governance systems and civil servants. This chapter examines the impact of key aspects of the movement, such as access to information, Open Data, and participatory policy making, on civil servants. The response typology proposed in Chapter 1 is tested within this dimension. The conclusion of this chapter is that this is the dimension of globalization that has the strongest potential to generate change in civil servants, as it directly addresses traditionally closed and non-transparent civil service traditions. At the same time, while many of the civil servants interviewed expressed adherence to the principles underlying the open government movement, very few were willing to uphold these actively when tested. This is therefore the dimension of globalization where the gap between formal adherence to values and actual behaviour remains the widest. It is also the dimension where civil servants remain closest to the traditional civil servant typology.
