Part 2 of 2: Strategies for RI civil service reform

Staffan Synnerstrom, Jakarta

In a professional civil service the various kinds of civil servants cannot and should not be managed under one single scheme, "one size fits all", especially not in a decentralized environment. In most civil services, civil servants are managed within civil service corps, for example one corps for accountants and auditors, one for prosecutors, one for academic university staff and one for health workers, etc. In Indonesia such corps could be established, having their own professional standards for qualification and performance developed by the respective line ministry in cooperation with relevant professional associations.

The employer, whether it is a central agency, a university or a regional government, should be responsible for recruitment and management of their own civil servants within the general policy and legal framework given by the central civil service agency and in accordance with the professional standards for selection and performance defined for the respective corps.

In a new civil service environment, the system for training would have to be fundamentally changed and the current structural training discontinued. Structural training was never to develop managerial or technical skills in order to improve performance and efficiency. Attendance is, however, a mandatory requirement for becoming eligible for promotion.

Training should instead be geared towards acquiring technical and managerial skills. To reform the training system two more things need to be introduced. One is that training should be demand-driven and related to the needs of the position. The other is that the market for training of civil servants needs to be opened up to allow for private training providers, leading to a situation where the state training centers (diklats), would have to compete with each other as well as with institutions outside the civil service.

Of course, key to comprehensive civil service reform is reform of the budget process. Indonesian public institutions have generally larger expenditure obligations than the received budgets cover and they finance a significant proportion of their operations from revenues that are not registered in the budget. Off-budget funds are raised to cover legitimate expenses, such as expenses for electricity, transport, telephones and other necessary equipment, but also for illicit purposes. Bribes, solicited by civil servants often go into office "kitties" and not necessarily into the particular individuals' pocket. This ensures that corruption is systemic -- participated in by all in the "pyramid" -- and thus difficult to expose and eradicate.

Aggravating this, basic salaries are considered low by the civil servants themselves and many do not perceive that they are paid a basic salary to do their job, but rather to "show up". Every action to be taken requires additional payment. However, many civil servants are provided free housing, free transport to the office, and free healthcare for their families, which are costs that private employees have to cover with their net salaries.

The practice of using a range of additional allowances makes remuneration non-transparent. The current incentive structure is not suitable for a professional civil service operating under the law as it makes civil servants opt for assignments that will mean additional money rather than attending to their basic job. It also further encourages civil servants to extort money from members of the public as well as from other government institutions to do what is formally their legal duty to do.

In a professional civil service, a mix of job-related criteria and individual-related criteria determines salaries. The first are linked to the job, such as responsibilities and complexity of the job. The second kind of criteria are linked to the specifics of the incumbent of a position, such as experience and performance. Finally, there needs to be transparency in how salaries are determined and salary increases distributed. The current plethora of additional allowances in the Indonesian civil service needs to be cleaned-up to increase transparency and provide for more accountability.

Civil service reform will require time and a gradual approach meaning that during a period of transition we may work in a situation where some civil servants and agencies continue to be subject to the old scheme while others come under new schemes. Successful civil service reform needs also to include how organizations are structured and how funds and staff resources are allocated and it cannot be based only on legislation.

Although Indonesia, as a transitional country, needs broader public administration reform, civil service reform should be a first priority. The quality of the workforce and the way it performs is key to improved governance and service delivery. Without addressing the current institutional and systemic deficiencies in the Indonesian civil service system, other reforms, including recent anticorruption initiatives, will not make any significant progress.

Staffan Synnerstrom is Governance Advisor at ADB's Indonesia Resident Mission in Jakarta. He is the editor and co-author of the Country Governance Assessment Report Indonesia (ADB, 2004). The views presented in this article are his personal views. He can be reached on ssynnerstrom@adb.org.