WeBER Policy Briefs

At the centre of the monitoring of public administration reform (PAR), there are topics that are of primary interest to citizens and civil society. One of them, which pervades practically all areas of PAR and on which the quality of implemented reforms can depend to a significant extent, is certainly transparency. Transparency implies that the goals of public policies, their legal, institutional and economic framework, as well as political decisions and all related data and information are delivered to the public in an understandable, accessible and timely manner. Relying on this understanding of transparency and the OECD/SIGMA Principles of Public Administration, the WeBER PAR Monitor methodology for monitoring PAR in the Western Balkans largely integrates the principle of transparency as one of the central components of good governance. The importance of transparency can be viewed from several perspectives. In the first place, transparency enables citizens to be fully aware of their rights and to fulfil their obligations timely and efficiently. It is also important for the smooth functioning of the market, i.e., so that economic actors can conduct their business in a free and competitive atmosphere. In connection with the previous, full transparency that enables public oversight of the [...]

Political influence on public administration is as old as administration itself. Given that civil servants are the ones who implement government policies, having control over them means controlling the institutions that execute political power and implement policies. This control also opens opportunities for rewarding loyalists and achieving political interests. When reduced to a minimum, such political manoeuvre is less likely to have a lasting impact on an administration’s functioning, but when it becomes overwhelming, a state apparatus can be completely captured by transient political actors, in the service of interests other than public. For a modern democracy, seeking to join the EU, professional and depoliticised civil service is necessary, not only for the sake of fulfilling membership conditions, but to enable society to achieve its socio-economic development potentials, and citizens to exercise their rights. In Serbia, however, international organisations and domestic civil society have reported on the issue of civil service politicisation since the start of democratic transition two decades ago. Still, the depoliticisation process, exceptionally prominent when it comes to the top echelon of the state administration - senior civil service (SCS), has gone unaccomplished to the present day. There are at least three inter-connected aspects of the [...]

Accessibility is considered a priority in a modern-day state administration. As an important precondition for achieving broader societal goals of social inclusion and welfare, accessibility has also become a clear-cut administration issue. Rising demands for accessible administrations - services, building, workplaces – but also for more equitable opportunities for getting jobs, including civil service employment, result from the fast-paced socio-economic and technological changes, which in turn require to accommodate as many needs of the population as possible. The COVID-19 pandemic outbreak is only one, but largely important example of how suddenly such needs for fast adaptations occur. On their EU accession path, the countries in the Western Balkan region must demonstrate that basic accessibility principles are sufficiently secured, as part of a broader, but fundamental public administration reform. According to international assessments that measure the compliance with such principles, the work is far from done – the legislative and policy frameworks are in place, the digital services accelerated, but mechanisms for improving the accessibility of services are weak across the region. The results of the surveys of civil servants and civil society organisations (CSO) implemented by the WeBER initiative, analysed in this brief, tell a similar story of weak [...]

The issue of corruption persists in Kosovo, as it does in many neighboring countries, and is undoubtedly one of the most significant challenges facing our state. Kosovo has made some modest progress in its battle against corruption, with a slight improvement in its score, reaching 39 points – three more than the previous year – on the 2021 Corruption Perceptions Index compiled by the international organization Transparency International. However, reports from international organizations and civil society in Kosovo consistently highlight clear legal limitations on discretionary power in the country, along with inadequate implementation and functioning of mechanisms designed to prevent, correct, and even sanction these arbitrary actions or misuse of official authority. This underscores the need for improving and enhancing the effectiveness of the justice institutions in combating corruption. Download the paper here (English) and here (Albanian)

According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), transparency refers to an environment in which the objectives of policy, its legal, institutional, and economic framework, as well as policy decisions and all related data and information, are provided to the public in a comprehensible, accessible, and timely manner. In a democratic society, transparency is a fundamental element of good governance which makes public administration more accountable for its work. Additionally, it helps citizens become more aware of their rights and obligations, as well as in better understanding public policy decisions, and it is a precondition for an inclusive decision-making process that involves civil society and all external stakeholders. Furthermore, transparency is a major cross-cutting issue in all areas of Public Administration Reform (PAR) in line with the Principles of Public Administration which represent codified EU membership conditions in this fundamental reform area. Yet, while transparency is recognised in Serbia’s PAR Strategy as an essential component of its public administration reform, eighteen years after the first Public Administration Reform Strategy was adopted in Serbia, numerous important aspects of the administration’s work remain insufficiently transparent. This creates an overall negative impact on the country’s EU accession process, by undermining [...]

The process of adjusting and improving accessibility to public services for disadvantaged groups in the Western Balkans is quite slow and not much progress has been made. This particularly applies to Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), where public service delivery should respond more effectively to the actual needs and demands of the population. In general, Western Balkan administrations aim to increase the accessibility of services to people with disabilities and reach the standards for accessibility. However, this remains limited to the legislative and policy framework, and not equally implemented in practice. Download the Brief here (English) and here (BHS).