How ‘smart’ is Public Administration in the Eyes of European Students? - Examining Behaviour Models in the Public Administration

Public administration

Term ‘administration’ will be further explained and defined in later section of this paper

We usually refer to this phenomenon as an information society, however, there can be a certain degree of uneasiness regarding the scope of the application of this term in the society nowadays, especially in the context of the rapidly growing presence of new technologies in day-to-day life of people in the society.

A Pawłowska, Zasoby informacyjne w administracji publicznej w Polsce, problemy zarządzania (Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Marii Curie-Skłodowskiej 2002) 11

The main question that this study wants to answer is how international students perceive changes in the behaviour models in public administration and what is the role of smart administration in it. In this paper, the international students, as parties in contact with public administration, will be taken into consideration and interviews with selected students will be carried out and analysed in order to identify potential perspectives, which might be taken into account during the process of creation or reformation of public administration.

This paper has been based on the data collected during interviews, conducted face to face by the interviewer, with four students, who are following the exchange programmes in Nijmegen in Netherlands. They are in a similar age group, between 20 and 25 years old and have similar economic backgrounds, as all of them identify themselves as a part of the middle-income class.

P Allum, State and society in Western Europe (Polity Press 1995) 73–74; Middle class situation can be categorised differently in various countries. They have access to higher education and training required for profession. They can be further divided into lower middle class and upper middle class. Class include members of free professions, owners of small businesses, executives, managers, engineers and manual workers

Dutch universities are known for their high educational standards and based on that, we can assume that the students who choose to go on Erasmus to this country will rather have developed opinions and views about the world nowadays. Similarities in their backgrounds suggest that as young, relatively well educated people, they may share a common vision of conduct in public administration. On the other hand, it can be assumed that because of these features, they may have strong, different and even contrasting opinions on the matter. Conducting interviews with a small group is advantageous in this study because, it allows interlocutors to elaborate their answer to fully express personal opinions and expectations, and as a result, give possibility to collect more detailed data, which help to better understand the way of their reasoning.

When standardised questionnaire in the form of a survey allows to collect more information from a larger group, the obtained answers tend to be general, repetitive and featureless as respondents answer them thoughtlessly, without care. Interview is more of a discussion in which respondents have lesser opportunity to avoid question. It also allows the interviewer to observe emotional reactions of the interlocutor, thus giving an insight into the method of argumentation and reasoning in order to identify, which influence them

Because of the limited scope, this research should be treated as an initial enquiry, which needs to be further verified by deeper researches about the expectation of citizens towards public administration. Interviews on larger, more diverse sample group and classifications of results may allow to more adequately determine the disposition of present and future user of public administration services.

Interview questions consist of two types of questions: first revolving around the background information about the respondents, and second, about their experiences, expectation, opinions and understanding of public administrations and its role in the society.

As stated at the beginning of this article, public administration undergoing a process of change to adjust its structure and conduct to challenges, imposed in information society, which can be determined by the observable fact of intense computerisation, informatisation and digitalisation, as well that its functions, are more and more centred on the actions of people or, one could even say, individual persons.

Dębicka (n 13) 228–229; Pawłowska (n 9) 12; Jastrzębska (n 5) 25, Overcoming Barriers to Administrative Simplification Strategies guidance for policy makers (OECD 2009) 23

Constant implementation of new technologies is followed by the changes in the understanding of the role of public administration and administrative law.

Błaś, Boć (n 14) 90; Janowski (n 10) 44

Generally, people in the society are naturally divided into various groups depending of their socio-economic, political, religious or ethical background as well as age and level of education or in a broader sense by their social environment. Therefore, specifying a common model of smart administration that satisfies all the needs is nearly impossible, as various people express different opinions and expectations towards organisation of public administration, scope of its actions or discretional powers, but also behaviour of public officials or manner how administrative matters should be carried out in view of the administrated person.

Classification of behaviours in public administration for purpose of this study was created by applying the existing approaches in administrative studies with concepts presented in the paper published by Patricia Ewick and Susan S. Silbey Common Knowledge and Ideological Critique: The Significance of Knowing That the ‘Haves’ Come Out Ahead,

P Ewick, S Silbey, ‘Common Knowledge and Ideological Critique: The Significance of Knowing That the “Haves” Come out Ahead’ (1999) 33 Law Soc. Rev. 1025

How people perceive public administration and its representatives is rather equally determined by the social context of the administrated person and the history of his contacts with public administration. Furthermore, we should also notice the difference between the expectation of the administrated person, who is a repeat player and one who is a one-shotter.

Galanter (n 30) 97

Concept of three stories about law, introduced by Ewick an Silbey: ‘before the law, with the law and up against the law’

Ewick, Silbey (n 29) 1028, 1031, 1034

Meritoric-despotism behaviour is reflecting the classical approach to public administration expressed by Max Weber and Woodrow Wilson, which is based on the principle of rationality

According to Weber rational system should not be influenced by moral or religious rules, but only by applying logic

Efficient-democratic behaviour represents the concepts of new public management, good governance

Theory emphasize the importance of subjection of the public administration not only to legal rules, but also various moral and ethical rules, which are derived from fundamental principles present in society, which transcend legal rules, but also give them ideological background

Lastly, anarchist-informal behaviour model was inspired by utopian doctrines of anarchism, and therefore, can be considered as the most controversial of the ones presented, because in some way, it contradicts the reason of existence of public administration or formal law in the first place.

L Dubel, Historia doktryn politycznych i prawnych do schyłku XX wieku (LexisNexis 2012) 358–359, A Sylwestrzak, Historia doktryn politycznych i prawnych (Wolters Kluwers 2015) 239. Anarchism is diversified philosophy, which, depending on the version, can include elements of individualism, collectivism, communism, syndicalism. Fundamental authors are Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Mikhail Bakunin and Peter Kropotkin

At the beginning of interviews, all students were asked general questions about their family and educational background. As mentioned earlier, all of them identified themselves as middle income class. Two of them came to Netherlands from west Europe countries: one had come study literature from the French region of Île-de-Franc, and the other, to study business communication and came from the German state (land) of North Rhine-Westphalia. Both of them lived in a small, countryside town and studied in larger cities. Another student of economy came from a large city from the Italian region of Lombardy on the south of Europe, and another one, who studied computer programming, came from the medium city in Romanian Timiș County in south-eastern Europe. While their parents and relatives followed different professional paths, none of them had relatives connected to any legal profession or had received legal training. When asked if they are discussed law or public related topics with family or friends, all of them answered that they usually did not, aside from the context of important social issues or events, and rather more in relation to the current political situation in the country. Participants’ level of personal knowledge about law and public administration was different and was related more to the type of studies. All of them expressed concerns about insufficient civil education in schools and lack of proper practical approach to this topic. The Italian student also pointed out the fear of teachers in school about talking about political matter and the German student mentioned insufficient unification of educational policy duo to the federal nature of the state. During their studies, all students had classes about legal issues related to their respective areas of professional interests, but in a limited scope.

When asked about the term ‘administration’, all the students were able to identify the elements of public administration, mentioning in the first place government, but also other institutions, like field public administration or local government. Even if the respondents didn’t know the proper names, they were able to classify administrative functions and institutions by type. Only the student of economic studies distinguished private administration from public administration without hesitation, but this relation was also noticed by the students of business communication. All, however, were not sure of the given answers. Most interesting was the reply from the student of literature, who broadly described administration as ‘social compromise and alienation’, expressing its philosophical essence. All of them also stated that they had contact with public administration only a few times in the past; thus, according to Galanter typology, all the participants can be classified as one-shotters.

During the interviews, the respondents commonly described public administration as a bureaucratic and centralised system, which indeed, is still the base model of public administration in the European and non-European countries. Interestingly, when asked if this should be changed in their opinion, their answer was no, with the exception of students from Germany, which, as a federal republic, is decentralised. He stated that of course he sees benefits of the current situation, but he also thinks that country should be centralised to some degree, in order to increase the efficiency of the system. Efficiency was placed by all students as the main argument for the centralised bureaucratic model. ‘We need centralised public administration to provide order in the society and prevent anarchy in the country’, said a student from Italy, but similar thoughts were also expressed by the other students. However, all the students also expressed the opinion that public administration should be less formalised, simpler and more flexible when dealing with outside people, but balanced with the need of being efficient at the same time.

All of them also admitted, that they feel forced to use public administration, and if possible, they would rather choose an alternative way of solving their problem. The student of economy stated that he uses it only because he needs to, but will be much more content to use the services of a private company instead. The French student expressed feelings that public administration is autocratic by nature but it should become more and more democratic in the future in order to serve people properly.

In their answer, all the students expressed the need for changes in public administration, but they also hinted that it still needs to retain its features, as mentioned in the previous sections. The student of economy as well as the Romanian student, both stated that public administration should be privatised and should extensively use services provided by private companies to realise its role in the society. This concept was rejected by the French student, who believed that private sector should be separated from public, because frequent interaction between them could be exploited and corrupted by power groups. Similar fear was expressed by the other students, but in relation with the concept of partnership or other closer forms of cooperation between public administration and private companies. The student of economy responded firmly that cooperation needs to have clear boundaries and customer-business relationship. In the opinion of the Romanian student, cooperation in the first place should provide benefit for people and not private company. More complex answers come with the question about inclusion of other parties into the decision making process in public administration. When all agreed that public administration should consult their decision with recipients and inform and educate people more about their activity, concept about negotiating decisions with recipients met with mixture between surprise and rejection. The student of business communication summarised this matter in the best way, who said, ‘idealistically, this could be [a] good and democratic idea, which could be, however, quickly exploit[ed] and paralyse [the] whole system’. Also, the answers for questions about moral and ethics differ between the students. The student of literature stated, ‘that public administration is system, which objective is efficiency, thus do not require human features as human administration is not administration any more’. He stated however, that he would welcome, if public officials would show more compassion and concern, when interact with outside people, but ultimately, it is not what he expected from the system. Other express opinion that public administration not always serves interest of whole society, but usually serves its own interests. The students of business communication noted that this could not be a problem, provided that the realisation of interests of public administration will also benefit the whole society. Similar thought was expressed by the Romanian student.

The student of economy mentioned that if not necessary, he preferred to not be bothered by public administration, but he also stated that public administration should be interested in the problems in the region and actively work to solve them. Administration has its position in the society and a mission to fulfil; therefore, it should not avoid its duty to the rest of the society.

In general, all the students perceived administration as a lesser evil, and even if they share many different thoughts, opinions and concerns about the functioning of public administration, none of them expressed any desire to violate, ignore or avoid obligation towards public administration. They preferred to have minimal contacts with public administration, but still see the importance of its existence in the society. Respondents differed in opinions regarding how it should be organised, but all of them confirmed, that public administration have the legitimacy to act and perform its duties. All the students expressed the same thought, which was worded in the best way by the Romanian student, who stated, ‘even if formalities seems to be excessive and procedure took long time, it give guaranty that established standards regarding public health, order and safety will be at least in some degree realised’. However, all the participants also stated that public officials cannot blindly follow rules, and if situation demands, they should also be prepared to act according to their reasoning, even against the law, in order to promote welfare or help people. However, their action need to be verified and controlled by both legal institution and people.

During their interviews, when answering questions, the students used argumentation and reasoning, answering in accordance to their beliefs, intuition and common knowledge. However, the respondents rarely used examples from their studies, possibly because they deemed them not relevant to the topic. A possible explanation for this might be that a major factor, which influenced their opinions, would be their individual personality. However, this statement must be also be modified by observation, that their answers were also inspired by situation in their home countries or towns. Even if not directly asked, during the interview, they made natural references to their country of origin. However, each of them highlighted similar points independently despite ethnic or cultural differences. One possible implication of this was that their reasoning was more determined by the social environment and experiences, rather than their country of origin.

When asked about the need for informalisation of public administration and simplification of procedures, the respondents were cautious about they argumentation, expressing balanced, possibly objective reasoning, seeking both advantages and disadvantages. Interesting was also their common, firm assumption that centralised public administration is required for the society to function properly. One could assume, that young people, especially international, will be more interested in informal and perhaps a little anarchistic behaviour in public administration, even if it could be considered a bit naive. There are several possible explanations for this result. Probably this development was the consequence of sharing common personal traits, originated by education and family background, as well as by access to global knowledge through information technology. Sympathy to centralisation should not be however confused with sympathy to any form of authoritarian leadership. None of them seemed to be content with the idea of a single person in charge of a country, and they criticised the occurrence of this type of tendencies in their countries and worldwide. However, scepticism towards decentralisation of public authority is alarming. This might be a consequence of poor education; thus, the knowledge about public affairs and the functioning of public administration, which was pointed out by the respondents, but perhaps also because of the poor performance of local administration, which can be caused due to bad implementation of legal rules, poor choices of local or central politicians, lack of proper findings or because of lack or insufficient communication between local authorities and citizens. Further and deeper researches should be conducted to fully identify the factors, which are determining this supportive disposition to centralised administration.

During the interviews, all the students mentioned that when abroad, they seldom had the opportunity to contact the foreign public administration, and thus have no base to compare it with home administration. However, even if not discussing public administration directly, they have the opportunity to share common life experiences. They also mentioned that sources of their knowledge are usually internet sources. This could lead to the development of more balanced opinions, in consonance to the obtained information about the differences between countries, and therefore, efforts to determine the common core model of expected behaviour of administration in international scale in Europe can be successful in future. However, such a statement requires further and more detailed examination.