Public service

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Tbilisi Public Service Hall Building, Tbilisi, Georgia Tbilisi, Georgia -- Tbilisi Public Service Hall Building.jpg
Tbilisi Public Service Hall Building, Tbilisi, Georgia

A public service or service of general (economic) interest is any service intended to address specific needs pertaining to the aggregate members of a community. [1] [2] Public services are available to people within a government jurisdiction as provided directly through public sector agencies or via public financing to private businesses or voluntary organizations (or even as provided by family households, though terminology may differ depending on context). Other public services are undertaken on behalf of a government's residents or in the interest of its citizens. The term is associated with a social consensus (usually expressed through democratic elections) that certain services should be available to all, regardless of income, physical ability or mental acuity. Examples of such services include the fire brigade, police, air force, and paramedics (see also public service broadcasting).

Contents

Even where public services are neither publicly provided nor publicly financed, they are usually subject to regulation going beyond that applying to most economic sectors for social and political reasons. Public policy, [3] when made in the public's interest and with its motivations, is a type of public service.

Sectors

The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) headquarters building in Tikkurila, Vantaa, Finland Keskusrikospoliisi Vantaa.jpg
The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) headquarters building in Tikkurila, Vantaa, Finland

In modern developed countries, the term "public services" (or "services of general interest") often includes: [4]

Trains are a public service. City of Rockhampton train (Sunshine railway station, Brisbane).jpg
Trains are a public service.

Implications

Public services can be constructed, coordinated and operated in many ways or forms. They include government agencies, independent state-funded institutes, government-coordinated organizations, civil society, Military and volunteers.

Government employees

Government agencies are not profit-oriented and their employees are often motivated differently. [5] Studies of their work have found contrasting results including both higher levels of effort [5] and fewer hours of work. [6] A survey in the UK found that private sector hiring managers do not credit government experience as much as private sector experience. [7] Public workers tend to make less in wages when adjusting for education, although that difference is reduced when benefits and hours are included. [8] Public servants have other intangible benefits such as increased job security and high wages. [8]

Need satisfaction and sustainability

A study concluded that public services are associated with higher human need satisfaction and lower energy requirements while contemporary forms of economic growth are linked with the opposite. Authors find that the contemporary economic system is structurally misaligned with goals of sustainable development and that to date no nation can provide decent living standards at sustainable levels of energy and resource use. They provide analysis about factors in social provisioning and assess that improving beneficial provisioning-factors and infrastructure would allow for sustainable forms of sufficient need satisfaction. [9] [10]

Characteristics

A public service may sometimes have the characteristics of a public good (being non rivalrous and non excludable), but most are services which may (according to prevailing social norms) be under-provided by the market. In most cases public services are services, i.e. they do not involve manufacturing of goods. They may be provided by local or national monopolies, especially in sectors that are natural monopolies.

They may involve outputs that are hard to attribute to specific individual effort or hard to measure in terms of key characteristics such as quality. They often require high levels of training and education. They may attract people with a public service ethos who wish to give something to the wider public or community through their work.

The process of assessing the needs of the people of an area, and then designing and securing an appropriate public service to meet those needs, is often referred to in the UK as commissioning. [11] The commissioned services may be delivered by organisations in the public sector, private sector or third sector: [12] when the private or third sector is involved the process of commissioning will usually be linked with a process of procurement, to determine who will provide the services, at what cost and on what terms. Commissioning is often seen as a cyclical process. [11]

History

Governing bodies have long provided core public services. The tradition of keeping citizens secure through organized military defense dates to at least four thousand years ago. [13]

Maintaining order through local delegated authority originated at least as early as the Warring States period (5th to 3rd centuries BCE) in ancient China with the institution of xiàn (prefectures) under the control of a centrally appointed prefect. Historical evidence of state provision of dispute resolution through a legal/justice system goes back at least as far as ancient Egypt. [14]

A primary public service in ancient history involved ensuring the general favor of the gods through a theologically and ceremonially correct state religion. [15]

The widespread provision of public utilities as public services in developed countries usually began in the late nineteenth century, often with the municipal development of gas and water services. Later, governments began to provide other services such as electricity and health care. In most developed countries, local or national governments continue to provide such services, the biggest exceptions being the U.S. and the UK, where private provision is arguably proportionally more significant. [16] Nonetheless, such privately provided public services are often strongly regulated, for example (in the US) by Public Utility Commissions.

In developing countries, public services tend to be much less well developed. For example, water services might only be available to the wealthy middle class. For political reasons, the service is often subsidized, which reduces the finance potentially available for expansion to poorer communities.[ citation needed ] The United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 5 is however, a global initiative which aims to influence the provision of public services and infrastructure to marginalized demographics. [17]

Nationalization, privatization and personalization

A group of Chilean 'Damas de Rojo', volunteers at their local hospital A group of Damas de Rojo.jpg
A group of Chilean 'Damas de Rojo', volunteers at their local hospital

Nationalization

Nationalization took off following the World wars of the first half of the twentieth century. In parts of Europe, central planning was implemented in the belief that it would make production more efficient. Many public services, especially electricity, fossil fuels and public transport are products of this era. Following the Second World War, many countries also began to implement universal health care and expanded education under the funding and guidance of the state.

Privatization

There are several ways to privatize public services. A free-market corporation may be established and sold to private investors, relinquishing government control altogether. Thus it becomes a private (not public) service. Another option, used in the Nordic countries, is to establish a corporation, but keep ownership or voting power essentially in the hands of the government. For example, the Finnish state owned 49% of Kemira until 2007, the rest being owned by private investors. A 49% share did not make it a "government enterprise", but it meant that all other investors together would have to oppose the state's opinion in order to overturn the state's decisions in the shareholder's meeting.

A regulated corporation can also acquire permits on the agreement that they fulfill certain public service duties. When a private corporation runs a natural monopoly, then the corporation is typically heavily regulated, to prevent abuse of monopoly power. Lastly, the government can buy the service on the free market. In many countries, medication is provided in this manner: the government reimburses part of the price of the medication. Also, bus traffic, electricity, healthcare and waste management are privatized in this way. One recent innovation, used in the UK increasingly as well as Australia and Canada is public-private partnerships. This involves giving a long lease to private consortia in return for partly funding infrastructure.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Natural monopoly</span> Concept in economics

A natural monopoly is a monopoly in an industry in which high infrastructural costs and other barriers to entry relative to the size of the market give the largest supplier in an industry, often the first supplier in a market, an overwhelming advantage over potential competitors. Specifically, an industry is a natural monopoly if the total cost of one firm, producing the total output, is lower than the total cost of two or more firms producing the entire production. In that case, it is very probable that a company (monopoly) or minimal number of companies (oligopoly) will form, providing all or most relevant products and/or services. This frequently occurs in industries where capital costs predominate, creating large economies of scale about the size of the market; examples include public utilities such as water services, electricity, telecommunications, mail, etc. Natural monopolies were recognized as potential sources of market failure as early as the 19th century; John Stuart Mill advocated government regulation to make them serve the public good.

Privatization can mean several different things, most commonly referring to moving something from the public sector into the private sector. It is also sometimes used as a synonym for deregulation when a heavily regulated private company or industry becomes less regulated. Government functions and services may also be privatised ; in this case, private entities are tasked with the implementation of government programs or performance of government services that had previously been the purview of state-run agencies. Some examples include revenue collection, law enforcement, water supply, and prison management.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Public utility</span> Entity which operates public service infrastructure

A public utility company is an organization that maintains the infrastructure for a public service. Public utilities are subject to forms of public control and regulation ranging from local community-based groups to statewide government monopolies.

A state-owned enterprise (SOE) is a government entity which is established or nationalised by a national or provincial government, by an executive order or an act of legislation, in order to earn profit for the government, control monopoly of the private sector entities, provide products and services to citizens at a lower price, implement government policies, and/or to deliver products & services to the remote locations of the country. The national government or provincial government has majority ownership over these state owned enterprises. These state owned enterprises are also known as public sector undertakings in some countries. Defining characteristics of SOEs are their distinct legal form and possession of financial goals and developmental objectives. SOEs are government entities established to pursue financial objectives and developmental goals.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Public sector</span> Public part of the economy

The public sector, also called the state sector, is the part of the economy composed of both public services and public enterprises. Public sectors include the public goods and governmental services such as the military, law enforcement, infrastructure, public transit, public education, along with health care and those working for the government itself, such as elected officials. The public sector might provide services that a non-payer cannot be excluded from, services which benefit all of society rather than just the individual who uses the service. Public enterprises, or state-owned enterprises, are self-financing commercial enterprises that are under public ownership which provide various private goods and services for sale and usually operate on a commercial basis.

A public–private partnership is a long-term arrangement between a government and private sector institutions. Typically, it involves private capital financing government projects and services up-front, and then drawing revenues from taxpayers and/or users for profit over the course of the PPP contract. Public–private partnerships have been implemented in multiple countries and are primarily used for infrastructure projects. Although they are not necessary, PPPs have been employed for building, equipping, operating and maintaining schools, hospitals, transport systems, and water and sewerage systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Municipalization</span> Process of transferring private assets to municipal ownership

Municipalization is the transfer of private entities, assets, service providers, or corporations to public ownership by a municipality, including a city, county, or public utility district ownership. The transfer may be from private ownership or from other levels of government. It is the opposite of privatization and is different from nationalization. The term municipalization largely refers to the transfer of ownership of utilities from Investor Owned Utilities (IOUs) to public ownership, and operation, by local government whether that be at the city, county or state level. While this is most often applied to electricity it can also refer to solar energy, water, sewer, trash, natural gas or other services.

In economics, a government monopoly or public monopoly is a form of coercive monopoly in which a government agency or government corporation is the sole provider of a particular good or service and competition is prohibited by law. It is a monopoly created, owned, and operated by the government. It is usually distinguished from a government-granted monopoly, where the government grants a monopoly to a private individual or company.

A social enterprise is an organization that applies commercial strategies to maximize improvements in financial, social and environmental well-being. This may include maximizing social impact alongside profits for co-owners.

The Indian government has, since war, subsidised many industries and products, from fuel to gas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Public/social/private partnership</span>

Public/social/private partnerships are methods of co-operation between private and government bodies.

The electricity sector in Peru has experienced large improvements in the past 15 years. Access to electricity has increased from 45% in 1990 to 96.4% in 2018, while service quality and efficiency of service provision improved. These improvements were made possible through privatizations following reforms initiated in 1992. At the same time, electricity tariffs have remained in line with the average for Latin America.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Electricity sector in the Dominican Republic</span>

The power sector in the Dominican Republic has traditionally been, and still is, a bottleneck to the country's economic growth. A prolonged electricity crisis and ineffective remedial measures have led to a vicious cycle of regular blackouts, high operating costs of the distribution companies, large losses including electricity theft through illegal connections, high retail tariffs to cover these inefficiencies, low bill collection rates, a significant fiscal burden for the government through direct and indirect subsidies, and very high costs for consumers as many of them have to rely on expensive alternative self-generated electricity. According to the World Bank, the revitalization of the Dominican economy depends greatly on a sound reform of the sector.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Water supply and sanitation in Rwanda</span> Water supply and sanitation in Rwanda

Water supply and sanitation in Rwanda is characterized by a clear government policy and significant donor support. In response to poor sustainability of rural water systems and poor service quality, in 2002 local government in the Northern Byumba Province contracted out service provision to the local private sector in a form of public–private partnership. Support for public-private partnerships became a government policy in 2004 and locally initiated public-private partnerships spread rapidly, covering 25% of rural water systems as of 2007.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">CAF – Development Bank of Latin America and the Caribbean</span>

CAF - development bank of Latin America and the Caribbean, formerly the Andean Development Corporation, is a development bank whose mission is to promote sustainable development and regional integration in Latin America and the Caribbean, through the financing of projects of the public and private sectors, the provision of technical cooperation and other specialized services.

Public utilities in Colombia are operated by private companies and regulated by the government.

An inclusive business model is a type of business model that seeks to create value for low-income communities by integrating them into a company's value chain on the demand side as clients and consumers, and/or on the supply side as producers, entrepreneurs or employees in a sustainable way.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nigerian Capital Development Fund</span>

The Nigerian Capital Development Fund (NCDF) is an independent social investment financial intermediary institution. This hybrid organization was set up mainly to address the challenges of poverty in low income rural communities in Nigeria. The institution mobilizes capital from the public and private sectors to invest in projects, businesses and social enterprises with the intention to generate good financial returns and measurable positive social-environmental impact, as well as act as a champion to help increase awareness and confidence on the advantages of impact investing.

In South Africa the Department of Public Enterprises is the shareholder representative of the South African Government with oversight responsibility for state-owned enterprises in key sectors. Some companies are not directly controlled by the Department of Public Enterprises, but by various other departments. Further, not all state owned entities are registered as companies.

Privatisation in Australia is the process of transiting a public service or good to the private sector through a variety of mechanisms that was commenced by the Federal Government in the 1990s, receiving bipartisan support. More generally, privatisation is a set of economic policies that is part of a broader system of deregulation of government services, underpinned by the ideology of Liberalism, in order to achieve economic outcomes of growth, efficiency and productivity. Some examples of sectors that have been privatised include finance, telecommunications and infrastructure. Australia's public service has also transformed with the introduction of New Public Management (NPM) in the late twentieth century which altered public administration models to appear more "business-like" through performance evaluations that emphasise efficiency, productivity and service delivery.

References

  1. ↑ McGregor, Eugene B. Jr.; Campbell, Alan K.; Macy, Anthony itua; Cleveland, Harlan (July–August 1982). "Symposium: The Public Service as Institution". Public Administration Review. Washington. 42 (4): 304–320. doi:10.2307/975969. JSTOR   i240003. ProQuest   197199863.
  2. ↑ "Definition of PUBLIC SERVICE". Merriam-Webster. Retrieved 2019-08-21.
  3. ↑ Anderfuhren-Biget, Simon; Varone, Frédéric; Giauque, David (December 2014). "Policy Environment and Public Service Motivation". Public Administration. London. 92 (4): 807–825. doi: 10.1111/padm.12026 . ProQuest   1639861884.
  4. ↑ "Services of general interest". European Economic and Social Committee. 2012-07-09. Retrieved 2020-06-16.
  5. 1 2 Frank, Sue A.; Lewis, Gregory B. (March 2004). "Government Employees: Working Hard or Hardly Working?". The American Review of Public Administration . 34 (1): 36–51. doi:10.1177/0275074003258823. S2CID   155017646.
  6. ↑ Richwine, Jason (11 September 2012). "Government Employees Work Less than Private-Sector Employees". Backgrounder. The Heritage Foundation (2724): 1–6. Retrieved 16 January 2016.
  7. ↑ Ovsey, Dan (27 May 2014). "Public sector stigma: The 100,000 workers Tim Hudak removes from the provincial payroll could have a tough transition to the private sector". Financial Post. Retrieved 16 January 2016.
  8. 1 2 Volokh, Sasha (7 February 2014). "Are public-sector employees "overpaid"?". The Washington Post. Retrieved 18 January 2016.
  9. ↑ "Securing decent living standards for all while reducing global energy use". phys.org. Retrieved 10 July 2021.
  10. ↑ Vogel, Jefim; Steinberger, Julia K.; O'Neill, Daniel W.; Lamb, William F.; Krishnakumar, Jaya (29 June 2021). "Socio-economic conditions for satisfying human needs at low energy use: An international analysis of social provisioning". Global Environmental Change. 69: 102287. doi: 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2021.102287 . ISSN   0959-3780.
  11. 1 2 Cabinet Office, Office of the Third Sector (2006), Partnership in Public Services: An action plan for third sector involvement, published December 2006, accessed 17 February 2021
  12. ↑ Cabinet Office, Modernising Commissioning: Increasing the role of charities, social enterprises, mutuals and cooperatives in public service delivery, page 7, published 2010, accessed 17 February 2021
  13. ↑ Rice, Michael (1998). The Power of the Bull. London: Routledge. p. 13. ISBN   978-1-317-72583-1. As the more advanced social institutions began to take shape they contributed to some counterbalancing of the essential insecurity of man's condition. It was inevitable that ambitious and assertive men should see an opportunity for establishing for themselves positions of power and influence. No doubt many such occasions had their origins in a genuine concern for the public good [...] The position of [...] the war-band leader as the strong arm of the community's defence would increasingly be confirmed by the subjection of the community to the members of what [...] were becoming, demonstrably, elites, [...] This period, embracing part of the fifth and all of the fourth and third millennia before the present era, is absolutely pivotal to the development of the modern world.
  14. ↑ Haley, John O. (2016). Law's Political Foundations: Rivers, Rifles, Rice, and Religion. Cheltemham, Gloucestershire: Edward Elgar Publishing. pp. 43–44. ISBN   978-1-78536-850-9. Pharaonic Egypt epitomizes a regulatory, public law regime. [...] The principal function of this elaborate apparatus was to maintain order and security, and, above all, to acquire as much of the surplus agricultural wealth and labor as possible.
  15. ↑ Hovey, Craig; Phillips, Elizabeth (2015). The Cambridge Companion to Political Theology. New York: Cambridge University Press. p. 4–5. ISBN   978-1-107-05274-1. To ensure the favor of the gods was the preeminent task of ancient rulers worldwide, for they all were priestly kings. The Roman Caesar was the pontifex maximus of Rome's state god. The Chinese emperor certainly stood over his subjects as 'Son of Heaven,' but if he fell into disfavor with heaven and his country was visited by famine, plague, earthquakes, and floods, he could be overthrown. The Moloch of Carthage demanded children as sacrifices; the Aztecs and Mayas offered their Gods still-quivering hearts. These political religions were do ut des religions in which the relationship between deity and worshippers was one of contractual exchange.
  16. ↑ by (2019-10-29). "Concept Of Public Service (1)". Andhra Pradesh PCS Exam Notes. Retrieved 2020-09-24.
  17. ↑ "Sustainable Development Goal 5: Gender equality". UN Women. Retrieved 2020-09-23.
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