Rabu, 29 Juni 2016

THE BUREAUCRATIC THEORY OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION Case Study in the United Kingdom



PARADIGMATIC GOVERNMENT BUREAUCRACY IN THE UNITED KINGDOM
THE BUREAUCRATIC THEORY OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION
Arrange to Fulfil Task of Final Exam of Bureaucratic Theory of Public Administration

Lecturer by
Dr. Lely Indah Mindarti, M. Si









By
Rendra Bayu Utama
135030107111106



FACULTY OF ADMINISTRATIVES SCIENCE
UNIVERSITY OF BRAWIJAYA
MALANG
June, 2016
 




PARADIGMATIC GOVERNMENT BUREAUCRACY IN THE UNITED KINGDOM




Introduction
A functional bureaucracy, despite all the jokes to the contrary, is what makes a democracy work. Without the effective administration of government none of the activities of government would mean anything with policies going both unimplemented and unenforced. However, we generally understand very little about government bureaucracies and how they allocate their attention. Even within governments bureaucratic agents face many competing concerns from a purely institutional perspective. In many systems the choice of which issues the bureaucracy attends to is largely autonomous highlighting the need for more robust investigations of bureaucratic attention (e.g. Neustadt 1969; Hood and Lodge 2006).

The functioning of the bureaucracy has of course been written about before from investigations into the behavior of bureaucrats (e.g. Wilson 1989) to the multiple discussions concerning principal-agent theory (e.g. Strøm 2000). Further, in depth studies of bureaucratic activities such as the in the United Kingdom (UK) oftentimes show the generally professional nature of the fourth branch of government (e.g. Page 2001; 2003). While these studies have done much to push our understanding of government administration, they fall short when it comes to understanding how bureaucratic attention is allocated. To address this shortcoming I propose the combination of theories on bureaucratic behavior with the growing literature and increased data efforts focused on government agendas and agenda implementation. By
combining knowledge about the bureaucratic process with a research tradition based on determining policy attention I am able to look beyond the bureaucracy as a tool for policymaking and to it as a separate actor with its own unique agenda.


How Government Works ?
The government is led by the Prime Minister, who selects all the remaining ministers. The prime minister and the other most senior ministers belong to the supreme decision-making committee, known as the Cabinet. The government ministers usually all sit in Parliament, and are accountable to it. The government is dependent on Parliament to make primary legislation, and since the Fixed-terms Parliaments Act 2011, general elections are held every five years to elect a new House of Commons, unless there is a successful vote of no confidence in the government in the House of Commons, in which case an election may be held in short order. After an election, the monarch (currently Queen Elizabeth II) selects as prime minister the leader of the party most likely to command a majority of MPs in the House of Commons.
Under the uncodified British constitution, executive authority lies with the monarch, although this authority is exercised only by, or on the advice of, the prime minister and the cabinet.[5] The Cabinet members advise the monarch as members of the Privy Council. They also exercise power directly as leaders of the Government Departments. The current prime minister is David Cameron, the leader of the Conservative Party, which won a majority of seats in the House of Commons in the general election on 7 May 2015. Prior to this, Cameron and the Conservatives led a coalition government from 2010 to 2015 with the Liberal Democrats, in which Cameron was prime minister.



Ministers
Ministers are chosen by the Prime Minister from the members of the House of Commons and House of Lords. They are responsible for the actions, successes and failures of their departments. Government ministers are also required by convention and the Ministerial Code, when Parliament is sitting, to make major statements regarding government policy or issues of national importance to Parliament. This allows MPs or Lords to question the government on the statement. When the government instead chooses to make announcements first outside Parliament, it is often the subject of significant criticism from MPs and the Speaker of the House of Commons.
Prime Minister
1
Cabinet Minister
21
Other Minister
96
Total
118
The Cabinet
The Cabinet is made up of the senior members of government. Every week during Parliament, members of the Cabinet (Secretaries of State from all departments and some other ministers) meet to discuss the most important issues for the government.
Government in Parliament
The Palace of Westminster, the seat of the Parliament of the United Kingdom

Britain is a constitutional monarchy in which the reigning monarch (that is, the King or Queen who is the Head of State at any given time) does not make any open political decisions. All political decisions are taken by the government and Parliament. This constitutional state of affairs is the result of a long history of constraining and reducing the power of the monarch, beginning with the Magna Carta in 1215.
Parliament is split into two houses: the House of Lords and the House of Commons. The House of Commons is the lower house and is the more powerful. The House of Lords is the upper house and although it can vote to amend proposed laws, the House of Commons can usually vote to overrule its amendments. Although the House of Lords can introduce bills, most important laws are introduced in the House of Commons - and most of those are introduced by the government, which schedules the vast majority of parliamentary time in the Commons. Parliamentary time is essential for bills to be passed into law, because they must pass through a number of readings before becoming law. Prior to introducing a bill, the government may run a public consultation to solicit feedback from the public and businesses, and often may have already introduced and discussed the policy in the Queen's Speech, or in an election manifesto or party platform.
Government and the Crown
The British monarch, currently Queen Elizabeth II, is the head of state and the sovereign, but not the head of government. The monarch takes little direct part in governing the country, and remains neutral in political affairs. However, the legal authority of the state that is vested in the sovereign and known as the Crown remains the source of the executive power exercised by the government. In addition to explicit statutory authority, in many areas the Crown also possesses a body of powers known as the Royal Prerogative, which can be used for many purposes, from the issue or withdrawal of passports to declaration of war. By long-standing custom, most of these powers are delegated from the sovereign to various ministers or other officers of the Crown, who may use them without having to obtain the consent of Parliament.
Domestic Power
  • The power to dismiss and appoint a prime minister. This power is exercised by the monarch herself. By strong convention she must appoint the individual most capable of commanding a majority in the House of Commons.
  • The power to dismiss and appoint other ministers. This power is exercised by the prime minister alone.
  • The power to grant Royal Assent to bills, making them valid laws. This is exercised by the monarch, who also theoretically has the power to refuse assent, although no monarch has refused assent to a bill passed by Parliament since Queen Anne in 1708.
  • The power to commission officers in the Armed Forces
  • The power to command the Armed Forces of the United Kingdom. This power is exercised by the Defense Council in the Queen's name.
  • The power to appoint members to the Her Majesty's Most Honor Privy Council.
  • The power to issue and withdraw passports. This is exercised by the Home Secretary.
  • The Prerogative of mercy (though capital punishment has been abolished, this power is still used to remedy errors in sentence calculation)
  • The power to grant honors
  • The power to create corporations via Royal Charter
Foreign Power
Government Departments
Government ministers are supported by 560,000 Civil Servants and other staff working in the 24 Ministerial Departments and their executive agencies. There are also an additional 26 non-Ministerial Departments with a range of further responsibilities.
The Civil Service does the practical and administrative work of government. It is coordinated and managed by the Prime Minister, in their role as Minister for the Civil Service. Around half of all civil servants provide services direct to the public, including:
  • paying benefits and pensions
  • running employment services
  • staffing prisons
  • issue driving licenses
External
Cleared focus on areas of priority
1.     Respond to emerging problems.
2.     Disinvest from some areas.

Greater coordination between policy areas
1.     Pooled budgets
2.     Policy networks
3.     Cross cutting working groups.
Administrative
Need to achieve efficiency
1.     Ration resources
2.     Combine services or roles
3.     Centralized service

Tackle underperformance
1.     Address management
2.     Merger or abolish departments
Political
Achieve political objectives
1.     Cabinet structure
2.     Manifesto commitments
Drivers of government department reorganization
Devolved Governments
Since 1999, certain areas of central government have been devolved to accountable governments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. These are not part of Her Majesty's Government, and are accountable to their own institutions, with their own authority under the Crown. By contrast, there is no devolved government in England.
In Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, devolved administrations are responsible for many domestic policy issues, and their Parliaments/Assemblies have law-making powers for those areas. Areas the Scottish Government, Welsh Government, and the Northern Ireland Executive are responsible for, include:
  • health
  • education
  • culture
  • the environment
  • transport
Limits of Government Power
The government's powers include general executive and statutory powers, delegated legislation, and numerous powers of appointment and patronage. However, some powerful officials and bodies, (e.g. HM judges, local authorities, and the Charity Commissions) are legally more or less independent of the government, and government powers are legally limited to those retained by the Crown under Common Law or granted and limited by Act of Parliament, and are subject to European Union law and the EU competencies that it defines. Both substantive and procedural limitations are enforceable in the Courts by judicial review.
Nevertheless, magistrates and mayors can still be arrested for and put on trial for corruption, and the government has powers to insert commissioners into a local authority to oversee its work, and to issue directives that must be obeyed by the local authority, if the local authority is not abiding by its statutory obligations.[19]
By contrast, as in every other EU member state, EU officials cannot be prosecuted for any actions carried out in pursuit of their official duties, and foreign country diplomats (though not their employees) and foreign Members of the European Parliament[20] are immune from prosecution in the UK for anything at all. As a consequence, neither EU bodies nor diplomats have to pay taxes, since it would not be possible to prosecute them for tax evasion. This caused a dispute in recent years when the US Ambassador to the UK claimed that London's congestion charge was a tax, and not a charge (despite the name), and therefore he did not have to pay it - a claim the Greater London Authority disputed.


Local Government
Up to three layers of elected local authorities (such as County, District and Parish Councils) exist throughout all parts of the United Kingdom, in some places merged into Unitary Authorities. They have limited local tax-raising powers. Many other authorities and agencies also have statutory powers, generally subject to some central government supervision.
Councils make and carry out decisions on local services. Many parts of England have 2 tiers of local government: county councils and district, borough or city councils. In some parts of the country, there’s just one tier of local government providing all the functions, known as a ‘unitary authority’. This can be a city, borough or county council – or it may just be called ‘council’. As well as these, many areas also have parish or town councils.



References

House of Commons Information Office. (2008). “Statutory Instruments.” Factsheet L7,
Legislative Series: http://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons-informationoffice/
l07.pdf: retrieved 18/06/16.
Neustadt, R. E. (1969). ‘White House and Whitehall’, in A. King (ed.), The British Prime
Minister (London: Macmillan).
Wilson, J. Q. (1989). Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies Do and Why They Do It.
Basic Books.
Yackee, J. W., Yackee, S.W. (2006). “A Bias Towards Business? Assessing Interest Group
Influence on the U.S. Bureaucracy.” Journal of Politics.
Jones, B. D., Baumgartner, F. R.. (2005). The Politics of Attention: How Government
Prioritizes Problems. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
http://howlocalgovernmentinunitedkingdom work: retrieved 18/06/16
Wikipedia : Government of the United Kingdom: retrieved 18/06/16





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