INTRODUCTION
Welcome to Running a Bureaucracy: A Guidebook for Local Government Unit Administrators in the
Running a Bureaucracy was crafted as a response to the growing demand for more relevant literature on Philippine public administration (PA) and the various disciplines that had grown out of the study and practice of what PA practitioners today call Development Public Administration. This term, I liberally borrowed from some of the country’s foremost public administration scientists and academicians who have endeavored to provide our nation much needed scholarly literature on one of the most, of not the most influential position in Philippine bureaucracy—the public administrator.
This book is deliberately “localizing” the scope of its discussions to the level of local government administration, the author herself being a provincial administrator for the past 17 years. The intention is to effectively juxtapose relevant readings, published works and traditional local public administration practices with the real-life experiences of the author and other administrators who have come to know the profession from the perspective of dynamic change and the continuing search for best management practices in the public field.
Especially influential in the development of this book are the career service executives, officials, professors and consultants from the National College of Public Administration and Governance (NCPAG) of the University of the Philippines (UP), the Provincial Government of Bulacan (PGB), the Bulacan State University (BSU), and the University of Regina Carmeli (URC), whose inspiration and contribution is appropriately acknowledged at the end of this book.
The Philippine Bureaucracy at a Glance
Volumes of relevant literature have been devoted to providing a clear and concise anatomy of the bureaucracy in the
3-Branch Centralist and 3-Tiered Local Government Structure
The Philippine national bureaucracy is a three-branch government structure composed of the executive, legislative and judicial branches. As of this writing, the national government bureaucracy is composed of some 14 departments, about 30 bureaus and hundreds of public agencies and corporations.
The Civil Service Commission in 2004 documented a total of 1,475,699 government personnel for 2004. This number included workers in the National Government Agencies (NGA) with 1,001,495, Government Owned and Controlled Corporations (GOCC) with
103,977 and Local Government Units (LGU) with 370,227. The National Capital Region (NCR) comprised the biggest number at 437,243 or 29.62 percent of the total workforce followed by Regions 4 and 6 with 156,993 and 110,369 employees, respectively.
On the other hand, the smallest government workforces were recorded in ARMM (42,226), CARAGA (40,075) and CAR (32,237). The trend continues to fall, according to recent reports from the Commission, due to continuous streamlining and personnel rationalization initiatives.
The 1987 Constitution retains the three-tiered structure of local government still being recognized today. Each local government unit has a set of elected executive and legislative officials. At the provincial level, the officials are the Governor, Vice Governor and members of the Provincial Board or Sangguniang Panlalawigan. The cities and municipalities each have a mayor and vice mayor and members of the Council. It is called Sangguniang Bayan for the municipality and Sangguniang Panglunsod for the city. They are all elected for a term of three years with a maximum term of only three.
Local government units follow the traditional Weberian structure of hierarchy of authority and functions. An executive branch and a legislative branch exist following the same national structure of power separation.
In addition to the elected officials, there are ex-officio members of the local legislative branch: the local presidents of the League of Barangays, the presidents of the local Federation of the Youth Council called Sangguniang Kabataan.
At the top of the executive branch is the local chief executive (LCE) who directs all activities of the LGU. The departrment heads are appointed by, and are accountable to the LCE. The appointment is done using the merit system and with the concurrence of the majority of all the members of the Sanggunian concerned. The departments with their own budgets which are part of the LGU budget, perform specialized tasks and follow standard rules and procedures.
Coordination among LGU departments is facilitated thorugh the Office of the Administrator, when there is one, the incumbent being the so called “alter ego” of the chief executive, for anticipating the LCE’s move on executive matters.
As of September 2007, there are already some 41,995 barangays, 135 cities, 1,493 municipalities and 82 provinces.
Philippine cities however have special classifications. There are component cities which are within the geographical and/or territorial jurisdiction of the province but by virtue of their city charters, the province does not exercise administrative control over them. There are those classified as highly urbanized cities which are independent of the province.
As a matter of policy, the LGU coordinates with the national government agencies through their field offices located in the province, city or municipality or through the regional offices of national departments.
It has been observed by vanguards of decentralization that despite efforts to legislate effective local autonomy, the latest of which is the Local Government Code of 1991, local governments in the country remain centralized under the direct supervision of the national government, as provided in Article 10, Section 4 of the 1987 Philippine Constitution. This is the functional essence of the 3-tiered local government structure of the country.
Article 10, Section 4. The President of the
Development Public Administration and the Bureaucracy
Raul P. De Guzman in 1993 argues that “while the Philippine bureaucracy may have these structural features—formally differentiated or specialized agencies, hierarchy of authority, recruitment based on merit, and a body of rules and regulations, the norms or values appropriate to these new structures have not been fully accepted by public functionaries and the people in general. The traditional values have not been quite displaced by the new norms, and they continue to influence to a great extent the behavior of government officials, employees and the general public.”
Guzman refers to the influence of family, kinship, religious, socio-economic, political and other groups that continue to impinge on the performance of government agencies and personnel.
In turn, administrators and employees continue the search for flexibility in their operations within the restricting confines of a hierarchal bureaucratic structure and a body of policies, rules and regulations which define, beforehand, what they can do and what they cannot do. As a consequence, Guzman theorizes that “what may be formally prescribed in government may not be effectively practiced”.
In another treatise, Romeo B. Ocampo, in Introduction to Public Administration in the Philippines, reinforces this view of the perceived conflict between “traditional” politics and development administration which takes into primary consideration the development goals of government. But he proposes that there is a middle ground for both worlds to co-exist and even thrive.
Ocampo proposes that “politics could and should be separated from administration within proper limits. At the same time, mutual influence and interpenetration between the two processes are possible and should not only be allowed but upheld, but again within certain limits”
These interesting arguments and other observations on contemporary public administration provide the raison d'etre, for the development of the book, Running a Bureaucracy. It is my belief that the job of the public administrator, besides being an effective manager who upholds the primacy of procedure and efficiency, is to consistently contribute to filing the gaps of politico-administrative affairs to make possible the evolution of local public administration into a development-oriented profession.
The following chapters of this book shall discuss in far greater detail how the partnership of good governance politics and development-oriented administration is possible and could take a local government to greater heights of efficiency, excellence and breakthrough leadership in the various aspects of public service.
Ours are interesting times indeed. The policy environment provided by decades of struggle for local autonomy and decentralization provides every opportunity for the study and practice of public administration to thrive. A defining moment in the history of public administration is the passage of the Local Government Code of 1991.
The Local Government Code of 1991: Unleashing Local Creativity& Innovations
The overthrow of President Ferdinand Marcos in 1986 and the installation of Corazon Aquino as President saw the promulgation of the Freedom Constitution which provided that "the President shall have control and exercise general supervision over all local governments.” This enabled President Aquino, through the Minister of Local Government, to remove local officials throughout the country and replace them with officers-in-charge (OICs). The appointment of OICs may be seen as a setback to the cause of local autonomy, but may be appreciated as a necessary measure towards greater stability
A year later, the 1987 Constitution was promulgated to include specific provisions that guaranteed autonomy to local governments. Among the major policies articulated therein was the policy that "The State shall ensure the autonomy of local governments". Additionally, Article X, Section 3 of the Constitution provides:
The Congress shall enact a local government code which shall provide for a more responsive and accountable local government structure instituted through a system of decentralization with effective mechanisms of recall, initiative, referendum, allocate among the different local government units their powers, responsibilities and resources, and provide for the qualifications, election, appointment and removal, term, salaries, powers and functions and duties of local officials, and all other matters relating to the organization and operation of local units.
Brilliantes and Moscare wrote in their treatise on Decentralization and Federalism in the Philippines “earlier historical attempts to decentralize power and authority to local institutions through various means are in recognition of the fact that the government indeed suffers from overcentralization and that it continued to exist through the years.”
Attempts at decentralizing government remained simple administrative formalisms. Power continued to be concentrated in Manila with local units heavily dependent upon the central government. In fact, before the enactment of the Local Government Code of 1983, local governments were beginning not only to be restive but also assertive, demanding that the umbilical cord that tied them to Manila be severed because this was the root cause behind their stunted growth and underdevelopment.
As a result of this and in accordance with the provision stipulated in the 1987 Constitution, the Local Government Code (also known as the Local Autonomy Act) was enacted in 1991.
The Local Government Code of 1991 is considered the most radical and far reaching policy that addressed the decades-old problem of a highly centralized politico-administrative system. The Code was welcomed by most sectors of society. It addressed the very nature of the power relationships between the central government of Manila and the thousands of local governments in the countryside through the devolution process. It finally transferred the responsibility for the delivery of basic services to the local government units, including appropriate personnel, assets, equipment, programs and projects.
Brilliantes and Moscare notes the following major features of the Code:
· Devolution to local government units of responsibility for the delivery of various aspects of basic services. These basic services include the: health (field health and hospital services and other tertiary services); social services (social welfare services); environment (community based forestry projects), agriculture (agricultural extension and on-site research); public works (funded by local funds); education (school building program); tourism (facilities, promotion and development); telecommunications services and housing projects (for provinces and cities); and other services such as investment support.
· Devolution to local governments of the responsibility for the enforcement of certain regulatory powers. These include the reclassification of agricultural lands; enforcement of environmental laws; inspection of food products and quarantine; enforcement of national building code; operation of tricycles; processing and approval of subdivision plans; and establishment of cockpits and holding of cockfights.
· Provided the legal and institutional infrastructure for expanded participation of civil society in local governance. More specifically, it allocates to non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and people's organizations (POs) specific seats in local special bodies. These are the local development council, the local health board, and the local school board. Because of their ability to organize and mobilize the people, NGO and PO participation in governance was encouraged in the areas of promoting local accountability and answerability, specifically through the recall and people's initiative provisions.
· Increased the financial resources available to local government units. By (1) broadening their taxing powers; (2) providing them with a specific share from the national wealth exploited in their area, e.g., mining, fishery and forestry charges; and (3) increasing their share from the national taxes, i.e., internal revenue allotments (IRA), from a previously low of 11% to as much as 40%. The Code also increases the freedom of local governments to generate revenues from local fees and charges.
· Provided the foundation for the development and evolution of more entrepreneurial-oriented local governments. For instance, it provides the foundations for local governments to enter into build-operate-transfer (BOT) arrangements with the private sector, float bonds, obtain loans from local private institutions, etc., all within the context of encouraging them to be "more business-like" and competitive in their operations in contradistinction to "traditional" government norms and operations.
LGUs Prove the Code Works
After over a decade of the passage of the Local Government Code, a number of success stories at the local level were documented. Energies, creativity, innovation and boldness have become the hallmarks of LGUs that had discovered the liberating provisions of new found autonomy.
However, like any landmark legislation, the Code has not been without its share of problems and critics. Proposals to amend the Code ranging from effecting full devolution of the entire government to phased decentralization, to recentralization have been forwarded and debated.
It was within this context that efforts have emerged to document "best practices" at the local level, to demonstrate, among other things that devolution is working. Thus came the advent of awards programs such as Galing Pook of the Asian Institute of Management and the Local Government Academy, the HAMIS awards of the Department of Health and the German Foundation for Technical Cooperation and Development, the KAME awards of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, and the various awards of the Department of the Interior and Local Governments including the Clean and Green Award and the Gawad Pamana ng Lahi Awards which has been variously referred to by local governments as the "Olympics of Local Government Excellence."
The Governance and Local Democracy (GOLD) Project has also pointed out many simple but innovative good practices at the local level in its various Rapid Field Appraisals. In all these, Brilliantes and Moscare notes, one observable fact has emerged: that devolution is working and that local autonomy has brought about creativity, imagination and innovation at the local level.
In the same paper, Brilliantes and Moscare noted how local governments have creatively generated additional resources by floating bonds and therefore provide public housing, something that was unheard of before local autonomy. There are also local governments that constructed public markets through the Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) scheme.
As an example, Mandaluyong with no resources but land entered into a partnership with the private sector through BOT and has constructed a public market that has approached world-class standards. Similarly, a small municipality in Ilocos Norte, Dingras, also entered into a variation of the BOT to construct its public market. Victorias, Negros Occidental and Legaspi City are examples of such local governments that floated bonds to meet public housing requirements.
Many local governments in the country have also placed environmental considerations among their priority concerns. Local governments have entered into joint ventures and cooperative arrangements within the context of maximizing utility of resources. They have set up their own provincial investment and business councils to maximize their entrepreneurial capacities.
The Provincial Government of Bulacan has been a consistent achiever in the winners’ circle of the Galing Pook Awards, the HAMIS, Konrad Adeneur and Gawad Pamana ng Lahi for more than a decade now. Governors Roberto Pagdanganan and Josefina Dela Cruz are indelible names in the history of local public administration of Bulacan and the country and are stalwart achievers in good governance practices.
Post-LGC Development Administration:
Trends and Best Practices
Posts
