Public Administration And Nation Building In Nepal

Nation-Building and Federalism in Nepal primarily deals with the presentation and elucidation of identity-based federalism, a unique concept and a novel form of federalism. The most notable source of first-hand information was garnered through the author's involvement in constitution-making by proxy, as a member of the High-Level State Restructuring Recommendation Commission and as a facilitator of several interaction programmes conducted in dialogue form: that is, dialogues with citizens, stakeholders, members of the Constituent Assembly, office-bearers within political parties (intra-party), and leaders across the parties (inter-party). This book, therefore, discusses these issues and helps provide insights into the politics behind the parties' shifting positions on contentious issues related to the constitution at the time of its making; understand better the conflicting aspirations from and competing perceptions of restructuring the Nepali state among the people from different ethnic backgrounds; and capture the role played by intermediate agencies at a critical time of its constitution-making (2006-2015).

Nepal as a nation-state was established in 1769 by King Prithvi Narain Shah. He was then a 'Raja' of the tiny hill-state of Gorkha in western Nepal. He unleashed a dormant national energy that saw the creation of a Hindu Kingdom of the Himalayas that was separate and distinct from both India, which was under British Rule (British Raj) in the south, and Tibet, which was within the ambit of the Chinese Empire in the north. In this work, Minto Jung Thapa looks at the efforts to develop the public administration system of the country following the 'revolution' of 1951 that ended the century of family autocracy of the Rana Prime Ministers. He places these efforts in the context of the constitutional and political changes that Nepal experienced from 1950 to 1974. He is always reminded of the words of philosopher George Santayana, "Those who do not remember the past, or who do not learn from history, are condemned to repeat it." Public Administration in Nepal covers many topics including politics and administration, the civil service, personnel administration, organisation and methods, institution-building, and the challenges of transnational inducement of change and development.

Nation-Building and Citizenship examines how states and civil societies interact in their formation of a new political community. Reinhard Bendix directs our attention to relations established between individual and state during nation-building. While the development of citizenship and the interplay between tradition and modernity are important in this process of social and political change, his key theme is the examination of authority patterns.Bendix explores in depth the possibilities of an alternative approach to the neo-evolutionary orientation many social scientists take in their analyses of the underdeveloped areas of the world. The subjects he discusses include transformations of Western European societies since medieval times, extension of citizenship to the lower classes, bureaucratization in the nation-state, private and public authority in Western Europe and Russia, aristocracies and development in Germany and Japan, and the development of public authority in India's political community. The book concludes with a reconsideration of ideas widely held about tradition, modernity, and modernization.In a new introduction, John Bendix writes that what continues to make this book relevant is not only what it can tell us about past and present nation-building, including the transformations of the 1980s and 1990s, but its more general messages about the nature of social and political transformations. Nation-Building and Citizenship is a necessary addition to the libraries of political scientists, sociologists, historians, and scholars of comparative studies.

This report reviews how national schools of government are adapting to address countries’ most pressing political and economic challenges.

This book examines public administration in South Asia in the context of rapid changes and modernization of administrative traditions, thoughts, and practices. The existing literature has, however, not given adequate attention to these developments, at least in a single volume. The book describes both the shared administrative traditions of Bhutan, Bangladesh, China, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka, and how far they have adapted their administrative systems to respond to contemporary administrative and governance challenges. The book studies how national civil service reforms have been carried out in each member state of South Asia and how the national civil service acts and different regulations are being implemented, as well as what are the critical factors associated with the implementation of national civil service acts and reform measures in the region.