Public Administration in South Asia

India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan

Meghna Sabharwal, Evan M. Berman, Meghna Sabharwal, Evan M. Berman

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• eBook ISBN: 9781351552660
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

A state-of-the-art, one-stop resource, Public Administration in South Asia: India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan examines public administration issues and advances in the Indian subcontinent. The book fulfills a critical need. These nations have the largest public administration programs in South Asia, yet existing knowledge on them is fragmented at best. Bringing together leading scholars from these countries, this book provides both an insider perspective and a scholarly look at the challenges and accomplishments in the region.

Focusing on the machinery of government, the book explores questions such as:

• What is the history of public administration development?
• How are major decisions made in the agencies?
• Why are anti-corruption efforts so much a challenge?
• What is the significance of intergovernmental relations?
• What is the success of administrative reform?
• What are examples of successful social development programs?
• How successful is e-government, and what are its challenges?
• Why is civil service reform difficult to achieve?
• How is freedom of information being used as a means to combat corruption and invoke grassroots activism?
• What can be learned from the successes and failures?

While public administration practice and education have become considerably professionalized in the last decade, a sufficiently in-depth and well-rounded reference on public administration in these countries is sorely lacking. Most available books tackle only aspects of public administration such as administrative reforms, civil service, economic developments, or public policy, and are country specific. None provide the in-depth analysis of the sphere of public action in South Asia found in this book. It supplies an understanding of how public administration can be either the source of, or solution to, so many of the problems and achievements in the Indian subcontinent.

Chapter 1

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Public Administration in South Asia

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Meghna Sabharwal and Evan M. Berman

Contents

1.1 Introduction

1.2 Historical Legacies

1.2.1 Ancient and Medieval Periods

1.2.2 British Colonial Experience

1.3 Powerful Bureaucracy

1.4 Bureaucratic Performance

1.5 Decentralization

1.6 Corruption

1.6.1 Causes and Responses

1.7 Administrative Reforms

1.8 Civil Service

1.9 Conclusions

1.1 Introduction

People have long found many different reasons to be interested in South Asia. Some interests are cultural, relating to traditions in yoga, meditation, and wisdom. Others are interested in South Asia for economic reasons, noting the rise of India and its contributions to the global economy in information technology, manufacturing, and services. South Asia has long been of economic interest, with trade patterns predating British, Portuguese, and Dutch colonial experiences. Some interests are also political, such as India’s enduring democracy, the geopolitical significance of Pakistan, and modern-day conflicts in the subcontinent. Other interests stem from a range of social development issues, noting innovative programs in Bangladesh and well-known charitable works in India (e.g., Mother Theresa). There are many reasons to be interested in South Asia.

Public administration is part of all this, and government actions underlie many of these reasons. Public administration has been integral to past and present achievements, and there is interest in knowing in what ways it has shaped these achievements. Today, understanding what policies and programs are made, as well as how they get to be made and implemented, is increasingly important knowledge that can be gained and transferred from other locales in the world, far from one’s own. Public administration in South Asia has notable achievements from which to learn. It also has travails and failures from which there is equally much to learn. Public managers have long borrowed experiences and ideas from others. Others’ conditions may vary, for sure, but there are key points and ideas to take away and use for one’s self. Now, public managers may do so on a global scale.

This chapter provides an overview of public administration in South Asia. It describes the “machinery of government,” how it works, and its strengths and weaknesses, and it provides examples and assessment of its impact. In doing so, we draw on the works of leading scholars of the region, and it is no exaggeration to state that nowhere else will readers find a comparative “one-stop” shopping for the topics discussed here on South Asia. Chapters of this book include public policy-making, administrative leadership, ethics, administrative reform, civil service, e-government, and much more. This information is presented in ways that allow for aggregation and comparison across countries. This chapter also goes beyond these chapters. We examine questions of governance, sometimes adding additional sources. From the aggregate of all the chapters, we find common threads and reach broad conclusions about public administration in South Asia. The conclusions and interpretation are ours, and although others might take exception, they are surely based on strong assessments of leading scholars of the region.

As regards these countries, with approximately one in five people in the world living in the South Asian countries of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka, the challenges and opportunities to the governments and citizens of these nations are enormous. Governments in these four countries are today, more than ever, confronted with balancing economic prosperity with population growth, poverty, citizens’ access to services and information, governmental openness, accountability, expansive bureaucracy, and national security. India is the second most populous country in the world (1.2 billion), but it has a literacy rate of only 61%^*, and one-fourth of the population is below poverty line. Its gross domestic product (GDP) of $1.7 trillion is eighth in the world (fourth on the basis of purchasing parity),^† but its GDP per capita is only $1,388 (compared with $48,386 in the United States). Although on average poor, it has a young population, with a median age of 26 years (compared with 37 years in the United States), and its middle class of 50–200 million (depending on the definition) is predicted to reach 600 million by 2030.^‡ Despite concerns about having a bloated bureaucracy, it has a relatively small public sector; according to one analysis, India has 1,622 government employees per 100,000 residents, compared with 7,681 in the United States .^§ Indeed, one of the paradoxical concerns about India is that its government may be too small, although, as we discuss later, most people would surely not want more of the same.

Pakistan is the sixth most populous country (190 million), with a GDP of $174 billion (47th; 28th on the basis of purchasing parity), a similar GDP per capita ($1,201), approximately one-quarter living below poverty, and a literacy rate of 62%.^* Approximately 20–30 million people make up its middle class. In India, 81% of the population are Hindus, and 13% are Muslim, while in Pakistan 95% are Muslims, as are 90% in Bangladesh. Bangladesh is the eighth most populous country in the world (161 million), with a GDP of $99.7 billion (58th; 46th on the basis of purchasing parity) but with a GDP per capita of only $700; approximately one-third of the population lives below the poverty line (down from approximately 60% in the 1980s), and the literacy rate is 55%.^† It has a small middle class (approximately 5–12 million) that is quickly growing. Sri Lanka is an island nation in the Indian Ocean, separated from India by the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait. Sri Lanka has a smaller population of 21 million and a GDP of $49.5 billion (50th); among these countries, it has the highest GDP per capita of $2,870. Only 9% live below the poverty line. Approximately 69% are Buddhist, and the literacy rate is 94%. The forms of government of these countries are described as federal parliamentary democracy (India), federal parliamentary republic (Pakistan), parliamentary democracy (Bangladesh), and democratic republic (Sri Lanka). Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are unitary states, and Pakistan has often operated similar to one despite its formal structure as a republic.

This book is the third, parallel volume to examine public administration in Asia. The first is Public Administration in East Asia: Mainland China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan (2010), and the second is Public Administration in Southeast Asia: Thailand, Malaysia, Hong Kong, The Philippines, and Macau (2011). Because each covers similar topics, readers may gain even deeper, factual, and comparative knowledge of public administration in Asia. As before, chapters are guided by appropriate reminders of cultural relativism and cultural provincialism. Cultural relativism refers to the principle that activities and beliefs of other people should be understood in terms of their culture, whereas cultural provincialism refers to the danger of one’s own cultural worldview blinding one from seeing other points of view. Well, try as one might to reach such standards, at least they provide constant and powerful reminders. We think it helps that the chapters are written by scholars of their respective countries, and that regarding the editorial team, one of us is of the region and the other not. We hope readers see this attention reflected in the following pages.

Approximately one-fifth of the human population lives in South Asia and is governed by its public administration, about which hitherto little has been known outside of the region and sometimes even within. The following pages add knowledge about its practices. Insofar as the conditions described below are also found elsewhere in the world, we hope this understanding also informs practices elsewhere. We know that readers in developed countries may also readily identify in their settings some features of public administration described in the following pages.

1.2 Historical Legacies

The Indian subcontinent (or South Asia as we know it today) popularly comprises India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Maldives, and Bhutan. These nations shared a common past up until the end of the British rule in 1947. The history can be divided into four periods: the Ancient period (2000 BC–AD 1200), the Medieval period (AD 1200–1765), the British period (1765–1947), and the Post-British (Independence) period (1947 to date). Public administration is a part of South Asia’s rich history.

1.2.1 Ancient and Medieval Periods

Kautilya’s Arthashastra, fourth century BC, is the first known Indian treatise on the subject of public administration, the economy, ethical conduct, and defense. Its 15 books are a comprehensive treatment of the affairs of state in which Chanakya (370–283 BC), as the author is also known, gives advice to Chandragupta Maurya, the ruler and founder of the Mauryan dynasty (320–185 BC). The Mauryan administration was the first bureaucratic administration in its true sense because it was hierarchical, merit-based, salaried, run by full-time employees (on the basis of written documents), and divided into departments. Mohammad Khan describes the Mauryan Empire as an “elitist meritocracy” based on loyalty to the king, similar to the political patronage in the West.

King Ashoka (304–232 BC) strengthened the administrative machinery and established the structural foundations of modern-day public administration. He reformed justice, local government, and welfare. Mishra describes that Ashoka divided the traditional administrative divisions of the empire into provinces or districts. “These provinces were further subdivided into Aharas or Vishyas, or subdivisions and Janapadas, which were further subdivided into villages. There was a clear classification of work for various functionaries in the administration who were appointed to perform the administrative work and the welfare schemes.” The concept of decentralization further took root during the Gupta administration (AD 300–600), in which almost all functions of the government, except that of determining foreign policy and declaring war, were discharged through the local bodies.

The Medieval period, AD 1200–1765, saw the rise of the Mughal (also Mogul) empire after 1526. The Mughals, who came from Central Asia, had a very centralized and militaristic form of governance; its emperors are direct descendants of Genghis Khan (AD 1162–1227). They invaded from Persia and brought Islamic and Persian traditions to the region. Ahmad states that “the roots of many of the administrative institutions of present-day India and Pakistan may be traced back to Mughal rule. The Mughal administration was centered on the monarch, who, through the Mansabdari system (rank-in-person system of higher bureaucracy), was looked upon as the source of all advancement and honor. The administrative structure of the period was largely put together by Emperor Akbar, who combined the military and civil services into the Mansabdari system with 66 grades.” Khan states that the Mansabdari system made the Mughal administration a bureaucratic organization by arranging all positions into a unified hierarchy and providing uniformity in career management. The highest officer was the Wakil or Diwan (chief financial officer), followed by the Bakshi (modern-day human resources head), the Qazi-ul-Qazat (chief justice), and the Kotwal (chief of police). Such an organization at every level, including the provinces, allowed for a system of checks and balances and a rigid hierarchy that “involved endless paper work and filing at all levels”—traditions that are still prevalent in South Asia.

The hierarchical structure of bureaucracy that is prevalent today has roots in the past. Other important legacies of the ancient period include division of society into four castes based on occupations (Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya, and Shudra). Tummala notes that although initially mobility to upper echelons was based on accomplishment, over time it became rigidly ascriptive. People were locked into the caste that they were born into. Today, the caste system is the basis on which quotas for jobs and education are decided in India as well as a source of some social problems requiring policy responses (e.g., immobility of the Dalits [untouchables] and intercaste marriages). Another legacy is today’s ethos, which has roots in the indigenous wisdom found in the ancient scriptures of Hinduism. For example, as far back as 313 BC, Kautilya noted problems of ethics: “[I]t is possible to know even the path of birds flying in the sky but not the ways of government servants who hide their (dishonest) income.” However, Sharma notes relevant precepts, Archet dana manabhyam, “Worship people not only with material things but also by showing respect to their enterprising divinity within,” and many other relevant wisdoms. Strong legacies from the past endure in the challenges, structures, and practices of modern-day public administration.

1.2.2 British Colonial Experience

In 1612, the English East India Company, after winning the Battle of Swally against the Portuguese in the Indian Ocean, established contact with the Mughal Emperor Jahangir, who permitted the company to establish trading posts and factories in the port towns of Surat (now Gujarat), Madras (now Chennai), Bombay (now Mumbai), and Calcutta (now Kolkata) in exchange for goods and merchandise from European nations. What started off as a trade agreement eventually resulted in British rule after the East India Company won major military battles at Plassey in 1757 and Buxar in 1764, defeating the Mughal emperor, as a result of which they obtained revenue collection rights in the modern states of Bengal and Bihar (formerly Bengal Presidency) in 1765. Mishra writes that “[T]he Regulating Act 1773 was the first landmark in the transformation of the East India Company’s commercial administration into a political government in the Indian subcontinent. It laid the foundation of central administration.” Finally, in 1813, the trading rights of the company were abandoned, and in 1858 the administration of the Indian continent (except for Goa and Pondicherry, which were Portuguese and French colonies, respectively) came under the British Crown (1858–1947). India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh share a similar past, whereas Sri Lanka was colonized by the Portuguese (1597–1655), the Dutch (1656–1798), and the British (1796–1948).

The unlimited opportunities for trade and natural resources were very attractive to the British, who took advantage of the internal quarrels among the Mughal kings and eventually occupied the region in 1858. India was industrializing, and mass quantities of cotton grown in India were sent to the mills in England for production. Civil discontent over British purchasing policies spilled over during the Sepoy Mutiny (1857)^* into rebellion involving several cities (including Delhi); this is known as India’s first war of independence. The British took total control of the region in 1858. Wealth was amassed through trade and land taxes, but restricted basic freedom, banned public meetings, strict press control, authorized arrests without warrants, and detention without t...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: Comments on Purpose and Method
• About the Authors
• 1 Public Administration in South Asia
• Section I India
• Section II Bangladesh
• Section III Pakistan
• Section IV Sri Lanka
• Index