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The federal public service plays a vital role in Canada’s development by helping to shape public policies and deliver programs and services to Canadians. Speaking Truth to Canadians about Their Public Service provides a comprehensive review of the challenges confronting the public service, how the relationship between politicians and career officials has evolved in recent years, and what motivates public servants. Donald Savoie calls on Canadians and their politicians to consider what they want from their federal public service. Answering this question requires a fresh look at the government’s traditional accountability requirements, how policies are shaped, and how government programs and services are delivered. It also requires a review of ambitious modernization and reform measures launched over the past forty years to make the public service more accommodating to political direction and to improve program delivery. Dividing federal public servants into two groups – poets (those who write policy) and plumbers (those who deliver programs and services) – the book establishes who has the upper hand. This division sheds new light on the theories that seek to explain the attitudes and behaviours of career government officials. Amid increasingly strong signs that the public service is in need of a reset, Speaking Truth to Canadians about Their Public Service concludes with practical recommendations to assist Canadians and their politicians in defining what they want their public service to be.
The demands associated with good governance and good public management are at an all-time high. Yet the discipline of Canadian public administration is in flux, and the time is ripe for an open and frank analysis of its state and possibilities. Canadian Public Administration in the 21st Century brings together emerging voices in Canadian public adm
The contributors to this volume trace the evolution of public administration institutions and explore issues such as the protection and improvement of the public service, recent innovations in the area of service delivery, and how this has created increased legitimacy and recognition from citizens.
This comparative collection of original contributions examines the role of political staff in executive government and the consequences for policy-making and governance. The leading contributors reveal that good governance is about governments getting the advice that they need to hear as well as the advice that they want to hear. They highlight the importance of ensuring that the advice is appropriately responsive to the policy priorities of the government of the day. In countries such as the United States, and in some European democracies, political appointments to senior administrative positions are not a new development. However, in recent years a third element the political adviser has also become a feature of policy-making and political management in Westminster-styled systems. This authoritative work seeks to illuminate the drivers behind the advent of political staff in executive government, and the consequences for policy-making and governance. This unique book includes case studies from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the Republic of Ireland, the United Kingdom and the United States. Academics and postgraduates researching in public administration and management as well as political science will find this book invaluable. Policymakers in agencies responsible for public service leadership will also find much to interest them in this important book.
To honour the distinguished career of Donald Savoie, Governing brings together an accomplished group of international scholars who have concerned themselves with the challenges of governance, accountability, public management reform, and regional policy. Governing delves into the two primary fields of interest in Savoie's work - regional development and the nature of executive power in public administration. The majority of chapters deal with issues of democratic governance, particularly the changing relationship over the past thirty years between politicians and public servants. A second set of essays addresses the history of regional development, examining the politics of regional inequalities and the promises and pitfalls of approaches adopted by governments to resolve the most vexing policy problems. Contributors provide readers with a valuable primer on the key issues that have provoked debate among practitioners and students of government alike, while reflecting on government initiatives meant to address inadequacies. Showcasing the practical experience and scholarly engagement of its authors, this collection is a valuable addition to the fields of public administration, public policy, political governance, and regional policy. Contributors include Peter Aucoin (Dalhousie University), Herman Bakvis (University of Victoria), James Bickerton (St Francis Xavier University), Jacques Bourgault (École nationale d'administration publique/UQAM), Thomas Courchene (Queen's University), Ralph Heintzman (University of Ottawa), Mark D. Jarvis (University of Victoria), Lowell Murray (Senate of Canada, retired), B. Guy Peters (University of Pittsburgh), Jon Pierre (University of Gothenburg) Mario Polèse (INRS-UCS), Christopher Pollitt (Leuven University), Donald J. Savoie (Université de Moncton), and Paul G. Thomas (University of Manitoba).
Canada's representative democracy is confronting important challenges. At the top of the list is the growing inability of the national government to perform its most important roles: namely mapping out collective actions that resonate in all regions as well as enforcing these measures. Others include Parliament's failure to carry out important responsibilities, an activist judiciary, incessant calls for greater transparency, the media's rapidly changing role, and a federal government bureaucracy that has lost both its way and its standing. Arguing that Canadians must reconsider the origins of their country in order to understand why change is difficult and why they continue to embrace regional identities, Democracy in Canada explains how Canada's national institutions were shaped by British historical experiences, and why there was little effort to bring Canadian realities into the mix. As a result, the scope and size of government and Canadian federalism have taken on new forms largely outside the Constitution. Parliament and now even Cabinet have been pushed aside so that policy makers can design and manage the modern state. This also accounts for the average citizen's belief that national institutions cater to economic elites, to these institutions' own members, and to interest groups at citizens' own expense. A masterwork analysis, Democracy in Canada investigates the forces shaping the workings of Canadian federalism and the country's national political and bureaucratic institutions.
Policy analysis in Canada brings together original contributions from many of the field’s leading scholars. Contributors chronicle the evolution of policy analysis in Canada over the past 50 years and reflect on its application in both governmental and non-governmental settings. As part of the International Library of Policy Analysis series, the book enables cross-national comparison of public policy analysis concepts and practice within national and sub-national governments, media, NGOs and other institutional settings. Informed by the latest scholarship on policy analysis, the volume is a valuable resource for academics and students of policy studies, public management, political science and comparative policy studies.
Canada officially achieved legislative autonomy in 1931 and has since developed into one of the world's most prosperous democracies. Though its political system is widely commended for its stability and fairness, it is nonetheless extremely complex. Particularly within the past five decades, Canada has undergone a vast social and political revolution, as exhibited by events such as the Quiet Revolution in Quebec, the ratification of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the Medical Care Act of 1966 and the official adoption of bilingualism and multiculturalism. As the world moves towards globalization, technology has likewise facilitated communication between previously isolated provinces and territories within Canada. Such developments hold significant implications for the role of Canadian politics, both domestically and internationally. The Oxford Handbook of Canadian Politics provides a comprehensive overview of the transformation that has occurred in Canadian politics since the country acheived autonomy, examining the institutions and processes of Canadian government and politics at the local, provincial and federal levels. It analyzes all aspects of the Canadian political system: the courts, elections, political parties, Parliament, the constitution, fiscal and political federalism, the diffusion of policies between regions, and various aspects of public policy. The Handbook examines recent trends such as the movement towards minority Parliaments and extrapolates potential developments. This handbook represents the work of a distinguished array of contributors, including some of the world's most prominent scholars of political science. This volume renders an objective, authoritative portrait of the Canadian political system: it is indispensable to anyone interested in the topic.
This book explores the thinking of Canadian federal public service senior executives through conversations. The transformation of the environment and of the institutional order has created quite a challenge: maintaining some sort of adequacy between these evolving realities and the frames of reference in use by public sector executives. Complexity is often nothing more than a name for a new order calling for a new frame of reference, and the reluctance to abandon old conceptual frameworks is often responsible for fundamental learning disabilities. Through a series of conversations with Canadian federal senior executives about more and more daunting problems - from coping with an evolving context, to engaging intelligently with a new modus operandi, to trying to nudge and tweak programs in order to correct toxic pathologies, to reframing perceptions and redesigning organizations to meet the new challenges—weaknesses of the capabilities of the Canadian federal executives to respond to current challenges were revealed, and suggestions made about ways to kick start a process of refurbishment of these capabilities.