Civil Service Systems In Western Europe Second Edition

"This comprehensive book will prove popular with scholars and students of public administration, political science and international affairs as well as civil servants, politicians and policymakers."--BOOK JACKET.

This thoroughly revised and updated second edition of Civil Service Systems in Western Europe presents a comprehensive overview of the important issues in modern bureaucracies and provides a comparative analysis of the civil service systems of various Western European nations.

The role and position of the civil service as core actors in the public sector has been seriously questioned in recent years. This volume provides a comparative study of civil service systems in Asia, Western Europe and Africa. The cast of international contributors provide new insights.

Scholars of public administration, economics, and political science, most from the region but some from western Europe and the US, describe the emerging civil service systems in nine countries, revealing the patterns that are developing during transition. They apply the methodological framework developed by the Civil Service Research Consortium to each country, providing a high degree of coherence that facilitates comparative analysis. They consider such aspects as the history of the system, internal labor markets, public opinion, relations between politicians and administrators, and civil service reform and development. They also take into account outside factors such as the possibility of joining the European Union. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

This revised and expanded edition of a benchmark collection compares how civil services around the world have adapted to cope with managing public services in the 21st century. The volume provides insights into multi-level governance, juridification and issues of efficiency and responsiveness as well as exploring the impact of fiscal austerity.

'This Handbook on civil service systems is truly international and comparative. It covers and compares countries from all continents. It also connects historical (Weberian) legacies to contemporary challenges such as coordination, the hollow state, and trust. Massey's Handbook does not avoid difficult issues for civil service systems such as ruined reforms, fiscal retrenchment, and cultural and political system shocks. Therefore this book is exceptionally rich and stimulating.' Geert Bouckaert, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium While there is no universally accepted definition of civil servant and civil service, this authoritative and informative Handbook compares and contrasts various approaches to organising the structure and activities of different civil service systems. Underpinning theories and frameworks provide a disciplinary perspective from which to explore recurring topics and themes, and international comparisons are made via case studies from Africa, Asia, Australasia, Europe, and North and South America. The expert contributors consider the historical and theoretical context of public administration and public sector management, encompassing issues such as the Weberian legacy, joined-up government and the hollowed-out state thesis. The debate between Anglo-American influenced systems versus the continental European approach to organising the civil service is also addressed.

This revised and expanded edition of a benchmark collection compares how civil services around the world have adapted to cope with managing public services in the 21st century. The volume provides insights into multi-level governance, juridification and issues of efficiency and responsiveness as well as exploring the impact of fiscal austerity.

Of all of the books produced by Ernst B Haas during his career, Beyond the Nation-State contains the most complete and definitive statement of 'neofunctionalism': the theory of transnational integration for which he is best known. Focusing on the International Labor Organization (ILO), Beyond the Nation-State was one of the first efforts to analyse systematically the dynamics and effects of a global international institution. Regarded as a classic in comparative politics and international relations, and among students of European integration, this book enjoyed a renaissance with the end of the cold war, reinvigorated European integration, and resumed interest in communitarian theorising about forms of global governance, which relied on a heightened role for international institutions and their associated policy communities. First published in 1964, Beyond the Nation-State was part of larger project described by others as neofunctionalism, regional integration, and soft constructivism, which animated Haas throughout his career. Beyond the Nation-State continues to provide valuable guidelines for describing and understanding contemporary IR, and is reissued with a new introduction by Peter M Haas, John G Ruggie, Philippe Schmitter and Antje Wiener, placing this important work in a current context.