Public Management

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Browsing Public Management by Author "Coetzee, Johan"

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    International, African and southern African instruments and institutions driving and inhibiting reform.
    (Association of Southern African Schools and Departments of public administration and Management (ASSADPAM), 2007) Coetzee, Johan
    A number of international institutions and instruments are both driving and inhibiting reform. United Nations conventions play an important role in creating a moral framework for reform. However, ratification is mostly a slow process and the enforcement of provisions is discretionary and inconsistent. The World Bank took the first steps to exclude companies that were found guilty of corruption, from tenders. Financial support to developing countries to bring corrupt companies to court will strengthen the World Bank’s contribution. The Council of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development provides much needed access to a powerful database on corruption and good governance. The World Trade Organisation is indirectly supporting corruption by not enforcing the reduction of subsidies, that cause an unlevelled playing field. The International Monetary Fund can become a clearinghouse for allegations of corruption. The Millennium Development Account gives countries that qualify for financial support a say in aid-funded programmes and hold them accountable for achieving results, paving the way for increased accountability towards good governance. The International Chamber of Commerce is concerned about the provisions in the United Nation’s Convention Against Corruption that is discretionary, and hampers development of binding and consistent international rules. These concerns need to be turned into action.
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    Perceptions on the impact of Chinese businesses in Namibia: A case study of the retail and construction sector in Windhoek.
    (Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, 2009) Niikondo, Andrew; Coetzee, Johan
    There are conflicting perspectives on the increase of Chinese business in Africa and in particular in Namibia. This study hypothesized that in Namibia, local communities, political leaders, local business community and workers operate on distinct repertoires, i.e. local communities tend to regard Chinese traders as a most welcomed addition to the local market as providers of affordable goods and services. Government, which is a signatory of various bilateral agreements with the People's Republic of China, believes in economic liberalisation and attraction of foreign investment. The local business community on the other hand, feels the pinch of market threat by the influx of Chinese businesses in particular in the construction and the retail sector. There are claims of unfair competition by Chinese businesses, in particular with regard to state tenders. According to this view, Chinese businesses do not have to adhere to the same costly legal provisions as local or South African companies have to, due to political favouritism and alleged corruption benefiting the Chinese. Organised labour (trade unions) seems to be concerned by the frequent non-adherence of Chinese businesses to Namibian labour law and affirmative action legislation. There is also evidence that Chinese companies bring along their own low-skilled labour from China, thereby taking away work from Namibians. Namibian employees of Chinese companies are expected to compare their situation in terms of pay, working conditions (working hours, annual and compassionate leave, management style etc.), fringe benefits (medical aid, pensions) to their counterparts in other (Namibian and foreign) companies. The principal questions to which this study tries to find an answer are: (a) What are the characteristics and the consequences (positive and negative, short-term and long-term) of Chinese economic activity in Namibia's commercial and construction sector in particular? (b) What has been the local response to the increased Chinese presence? (c) What are the policy suggestions in order to, on the one hand, maximise the benefits to Namibia and, on the other hand, minimise the costs and negative impacts of the Chinese expansion into the Namibian society?
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    Role of culture and change management in sustainable public service reform.
    (Association of Southern African Schools and Departments of Public Administration and Management (ASSADPAM)., 2007) Coetzee, Johan
    Culture and change is complex, unpredictable and cannot be managed but do have prospects for steering. This paper concurs with Van Tonder that change management is cultural management; and also with Bate that culture and strategy are substitutes. For understanding the concept of institutional culture, the Three Layered Diagram of Schultz, et al. was found to be simplistic but useful. The ‘new’ and ‘strong’ culture provides design parameter for cultural change or reform. This paper recommends design parameters for reform of public services in the Southern African Development Community (SADC); and complements the research of Bate in providing a more detailed roadmap for institutional cultural change consisting of the following integrated phases or dimensions: Structural (understanding); spatial and temporal (origins and trajectory); processual (life cycle); contextual (environmental context) and subjective (objectives and ambitions of role players). Amongst other, the following institutional cultural change applications are discussed: For understanding a specific institutional culture, the Organisational Checklist of the United Kingdom Civil Service College is recommended; and an in-depth knowledge and thorough cultural assessment. For strategy formulation, the 7-S Strategy Framework of McKinsey, is useful but not without its limitations. This framework can be combined with the Balanced Scorecard of Kaplan and Norton to provide balanced and cohesive strategies for reform.
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    Understanding systemic corruption
    (2013) Coetzee, Johan
    During the last two decades the debate about corruption and ways to understand and contain it acquired a new intensity and concentrated focus. However, applications to contain it sustainably are of mixed success. The World Bank (WB) defined corruption as “the abuse of public office for private gain”. This is one of the most commonly used definitions of corruption within the public domain. The expanded definition of the WB distinguishes between „isolated‟ and „systemic‟ corruption, World Bank Report (1997: 9-10). The WB‟s definition fails to accept the general nature of corruption as being systemic - a concept that suggests interdependence on deviate behaviour in public and/or private sector institutions. Corruption is a function of dishonesty, a lack of integrity and the abuse of private and/or public office for personal gain. In order to understand corruption systemically, it should be perceived as a subsystem of a social system that is embedded in ethics, the economy, politics, science and technology, and aesthetics. Systemic corruption is not only an impairment of integrity, virtue and moral principle(s), but a departure from the original purpose, processes, structure, governance and context of systems created with the intention to be pure and correct and to enable development. The multidimensional dynamics of corruption to take on various „masks‟, make it an elusive phenomenon. As a complex subsystem, corruption takes on a life of its own that is self sustaining - corruption strengthens corruption. Corruption is a pervasive social pathology with various co-producers that all contribute to corruption. In the absence of root causes, systemic corruption cannot be analysed but needs to be dissolved in the context of the particular environment, taking into consideration the interrelationships between its structure, purpose, governance and processes. To address corruption sustainably, corruption should be first be understood as a complex systemic phenomenon.