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STRESSES MOUNT FOR BUREAUCRATS
James Travers
Toronto Star, Canada
June 28 2007
Ottawa
Stephen Harper's frustration is only one sign of rising tension
between Conservatives and civil servants. Just two weeks before the
Prime Minister railed privately at resistant bureaucrats, Defence
Minister Gordon O'Connor publicly embarrassed his top general for a
policy failure.
The cases are different in detail. Harper accused headstrong mandarins
of opposing recognition of the 1915 murder of some 1.5 million
Armenians as genocide, while O'Connor said Rick Hillier had failed
to ensure families of soldiers killed in Afghanistan are adequately
compensated for funeral costs.
But the similarities are deep and instructive. Each probes the
relationship essential to the effective operation of intricate
government machinery and exposes the pressures now pulling it apart.
In theory, non-partisan mandarins advise and ministers decide.
Equally important, bureaucrats are anonymous while politicians reap
the rewards in good times and accept responsibility in bad.
In daily practice, the lines are blurring and the system breaking
down. Bureaucrats paid to provide sound policies feel ignored by an
ideologically certain cabinet and are understandably angry when held
publicly responsible when things go wrong.
That's an accelerating trend, not a new phenomenon. For decades
ruling parties concentrated power at the centre and made scapegoats of
bureaucrats. Liberals are living proof. Lest anyone forget, politicians
escaped essentially unscathed from the Quebec sponsorship scam and
from the human resources grants fiasco while bureaucrats were charged
or ridiculed.
Conservatives remain commendably clear of similar scandal. Still,
what should have been a supportive partnership has only deteriorated
since Harper took a wild pre-election swipe at everyone he considers
Liberal hacks.
Much of the trouble tracks to arguably the most insular modern
prime minister. Blinded by the beauty of Conservative solutions,
Harper relies on his intellectual strength and ideological intuition
while closing the door to all but a clique of officials, ministers
and deputies.
There's more to it than a private, often prickly, personal style.
Conflicting pressures squeeze the Prime Minister between relentless
demands for top-down decisions and the equally pressing need to solve
problems that sweep across departments.
On a consultant's graph, the prime minister is the high point of the
vertical command-and-control axis, while the public service spreads
across the horizontal policy axis. The result is a push-me, pull-you
structure failing under impossibly heavy loads.
When that happens, this prime minister bashes the bureaucracy for
resisting changes in political direction and his defence minister
blames the top soldier. Rare now, those ugly incidents will increase as
stresses mount on a minority government and on bureaucrats struggling
to respond innovatively to complexity.
Pillorying bureaucrats who can't defend themselves increases resentment
and makes it more difficult for those charged with steering and rowing
the state to constructively hold a course.
But structural reconstruction is also urgently needed. The critical
relationship between politicians and public servants is cracking as
Ottawa struggles to make timely, often controversial decisions that
overwhelm the capacity and accountability of a system that is isolated
from modern realities and evolving too slowly.
James Travers
Toronto Star, Canada
June 28 2007
Ottawa
Stephen Harper's frustration is only one sign of rising tension
between Conservatives and civil servants. Just two weeks before the
Prime Minister railed privately at resistant bureaucrats, Defence
Minister Gordon O'Connor publicly embarrassed his top general for a
policy failure.
The cases are different in detail. Harper accused headstrong mandarins
of opposing recognition of the 1915 murder of some 1.5 million
Armenians as genocide, while O'Connor said Rick Hillier had failed
to ensure families of soldiers killed in Afghanistan are adequately
compensated for funeral costs.
But the similarities are deep and instructive. Each probes the
relationship essential to the effective operation of intricate
government machinery and exposes the pressures now pulling it apart.
In theory, non-partisan mandarins advise and ministers decide.
Equally important, bureaucrats are anonymous while politicians reap
the rewards in good times and accept responsibility in bad.
In daily practice, the lines are blurring and the system breaking
down. Bureaucrats paid to provide sound policies feel ignored by an
ideologically certain cabinet and are understandably angry when held
publicly responsible when things go wrong.
That's an accelerating trend, not a new phenomenon. For decades
ruling parties concentrated power at the centre and made scapegoats of
bureaucrats. Liberals are living proof. Lest anyone forget, politicians
escaped essentially unscathed from the Quebec sponsorship scam and
from the human resources grants fiasco while bureaucrats were charged
or ridiculed.
Conservatives remain commendably clear of similar scandal. Still,
what should have been a supportive partnership has only deteriorated
since Harper took a wild pre-election swipe at everyone he considers
Liberal hacks.
Much of the trouble tracks to arguably the most insular modern
prime minister. Blinded by the beauty of Conservative solutions,
Harper relies on his intellectual strength and ideological intuition
while closing the door to all but a clique of officials, ministers
and deputies.
There's more to it than a private, often prickly, personal style.
Conflicting pressures squeeze the Prime Minister between relentless
demands for top-down decisions and the equally pressing need to solve
problems that sweep across departments.
On a consultant's graph, the prime minister is the high point of the
vertical command-and-control axis, while the public service spreads
across the horizontal policy axis. The result is a push-me, pull-you
structure failing under impossibly heavy loads.
When that happens, this prime minister bashes the bureaucracy for
resisting changes in political direction and his defence minister
blames the top soldier. Rare now, those ugly incidents will increase as
stresses mount on a minority government and on bureaucrats struggling
to respond innovatively to complexity.
Pillorying bureaucrats who can't defend themselves increases resentment
and makes it more difficult for those charged with steering and rowing
the state to constructively hold a course.
But structural reconstruction is also urgently needed. The critical
relationship between politicians and public servants is cracking as
Ottawa struggles to make timely, often controversial decisions that
overwhelm the capacity and accountability of a system that is isolated
from modern realities and evolving too slowly.