Public sector reform in Sub‐Saharan Africa: what can be learnt from the civil service performance improvement programme in Ghana?

Abstract

This paper focuses on public sector management reform ‘best‐practice’ case experience from Sub‐Sahara African (SSA). Given that ‘best‐practice’ is a relative concept and often debatable, the paper uses the Ghana Civil Service Performance Improvement Programme (GCSPIP) experience as rather a ‘good‐practice’ case with the view to sharing the outcome and lessons to encourage collaborative‐learning. It seeks to share the outcome and lessons learnt by the Ghana civil service reform with future public service reformers and to contribute to the literature. The paper concludes with an adaptable three‐dimensional framework. The framework argues that successful future public service reform (PSR) should consider three broad issues: first, are the ‘critical success factors’, including wholehearted political leadership commitment; wholehearted bureaucratic leadership commitment; thoughtful synergistic planning/preparation; patience for implementation and evaluation; capacity to convince; neutralise and accommodate reform‐phobias and critics; sustainable financial and technical resource availability and conscious nurturing of general public support. Second, is the need for reformers to appreciate the concerns of the public and the civil society scepticism of public ‘institutions’ and its ‘operatives’ and finally placing any reform programme in a country‐specific context, including understanding its history, culture, politics, economy, sociology, ideology and values. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Designing Effective Civil Service Reform Lessons From Past Experience

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The Search for a Result-Oriented Public Sector Reform in Ghana: A Myth or Reality?

“…On return to constitutional rule and democratic governance in 1993, the public sector was still operating moribund hence, the search for a new approach to breath new breathe into it. In ISSN 2161-7104 2020 response, the civilian NDC government (1993)(1994)(1995)(1996)(1997)(1998)(1999)(2000), passed the Civil Service Law 1993 (Act 327) and initiated the Civil Service Performance Improvement Programme (CSPIP) with the view to addressing the structural and performance culture defects that had plagued the service (Ohemeng and Ayee, 2016:288;Antwi et al, 2008;Wereko, 2008). This reform was driven by the market-oriented ideology and had the National Institutional Renewal Programmes (NIRP) as the institutional home for all the reforms.…”

The impact of employee perception on the successful institutionalisation and implementation of performance management systems in developing countries: The perspective from Ghana's public service

“…With regard to the Civil Service, in 1994, a Civil Service Performance Improvement Plan was instituted-a reform agenda designed to make it a performance-driven institution (Antwi, Analoui, & Nana-Agyekum, 2008;Dodoo, 1997). Before that, personnel performance had been assessed through the Annual Confidential Report System, which was fraught with problems (Bawole et al, 2013;Ohemeng, 2009).…”