BUILDING INSTITUTIONS FOR PUBLIC SECTOR PROFESSIONALISM
IN CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE *
Alexander Kovryga[1] and Sherman Wyman[2]
“Man Owes What He is to Union with His Fellow Man” O.V. Gierke
This paper is premised on the assumption that the scope and quality of public sector professionalism critical to healthy political-administrative relations in any developing or developed democratic state. Initially we will explore the nature of professionalism and profession and then turn to a selective review of the development of public sector professionalism in both developed and developing countries throughout the world. From this review we will attempt to identify key institutions, functions and roles appropriate to professionalization in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE).
· Profession and Professionalization in the Context of Social and Economic Re-engineering
The Dangers of Professionalization:
This paper is guided by the principle of methodological determinism. This principle means if we are about to be practical and realistic in social and economic reformation in transitional countries, we must possess a methods and instruments that complement and compatible with the object of our activity.. The ability of change agents to intervene in the transitional processes is directly connected with whether or not they are armed by appropriate means. Thus, the deliberate building of open democratic societies and market-driven economies (DSMDE) is possible if we are armed both conceptually and instrumentally with an appropriate vision of what must to be done, and equipped with effective methods and processes.
Among the variety of different topics and lines of enquiry established during the course of the CEE transition are two quite complicated and less developed issues: 1) the processes of public sector professionalization and 2) building institutional infrastructure for public sector professionalism (IIPSP). We assume that the CEE transition is, a reality of institutional transformation and institutional building.[3] In this context we have to concentrate on conceptions which reflect the entire construction of the process of societal reproduction and are therefore capable of capturing the elusive reality of transition in form adequate for operationalization and practical interventions. Our study built on the hypothesis that the profession is such a conception and a proper set of polymorphous institutions. We also assume that the complexity of IIPSP demands extensive multi-disciplinary research, complex public policy changes and well-grounded re-formations.[4]
Naturally we need to check and verify its very basic questions such as the following: What are the contemporary institutions, which are adequate to the history, culture and modern situation? Which institutions can serve as real vehicles in the transmission of our cultural heritage, cope with nowadays technological and managerial revolutions, and fit into extremely demanding frameworks of up-to-date political and moral requirements?
The context for the institutionalization of professional public administration in transitional countries is the globalization of institutional markets and processes for accelerated change in public management. We have to deal with the transnational macroprocess of re-institutionalization and search for new forms of relations between state, regional and local institutions, socio-cultural, economic, and political traditions.[5]
A major reshaping of systems of governance and public administration (GPA)[6] in developed as well as in transitional countries, has accelerated during the mid-eighties and nineties. These phenomena are captured by a number of social scientists and theoreticians.[7] They require a revolutionary change in public administration involving a paradigm shift form the historically dominant Weberian model of bureaucracy to the new public management (NPM). NPM is set of management ideas, which has been heavily influenced by values and governance techniques derived from economics.[8] NPM has played a major role in the administrative reforms of many OECD countries.[9] These attempts to reshape and improve public administration and governance produced in the U.S. and Europe what has been called a ‘movement to reinvent government in public administration’ and a 'new public management revolution'.[10] The primary efforts here focused on: reducing the size of government through programs of privatization, restructuring of government departments, productivity programs, and retrenchment and retraining of public servants. These programs, often driven by the World Bank/IMF structural adjustment loans, are reflected in the CEE countries in EC PHARE and TACIS programs, TRANSFORM, etc. Thus, the dramatic political and economic changes in the CEE transitional countries have been joined with externally driven mandates for institutional reorganization and new institutional capacities. The deficiency of competence, low effectiveness and functional inadequacy of existent systems in CEE countries, major parts of which were inherited from the soviet times, are a leading cause for the movement for professionalization. The speed and success in transition to DSMDE considered as largely depended on the professionalization of GPA.[11] We therefore argue that public sector professionalism is a if not the key instrument in reform and cultural policy of the CEE.
Walton Hamilton coined the term institutionalism in 1916. He provides one of the most deep wording of idea of an institution which “connotes a way of thought or action of some prevalence and permanence, which is embedded in the habits of a group or the custom of a people… Institutions fix the confines of and impose form upon the activities of human beings. The world of use and wont, to which imperfectly we accommodate our lives, is tangled and unbroken web of institutions.”[12]
Our culture is a synthesis or an aggregation of institutions, at the same time the approach and way of knowledge itself should be considered as an institution. Moreover, among the different ways of knowing is the institutionalism. “Institutes as the ordained principles of a realm of learning or of life have long existed; they are known to theology, law, education and all subjects ruled over by dialectic… The institutional method had to wait until the idea of development was incorporated into academic thought and the mind of the inquirer became resigned to the inconsistency which attends growth.”[13]
The main points of the institutional approach can already be found, for example, in the works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. He criticizes Hobbes, Locke and others for their assumption on the nature of the behavior of possessive individuals in a particular historical and social context. He argues that so-called “men's natural preferences and traits of all human beings” are products of particular social and institutional environments. “Rousseau viewed preferences, such as the desire to accumulate property, not as universal postulates upon which one could found a scientific theory of politics, but as products of society-- its norms and its institutions.”[14]
The institutionalism as an approach to study in social sciences rooted into works of Wilhelm Roscher, Gustav Schmoller and others of German historical school or Historismus.[15] The Methodenstreit – as a methodological discussion on meaning of history and epistemological approaches in social sciences between Austrian and German schools gave the birth and the core “spirit” of this approach.[16]
Although some aspects of institutional approach could be found in works of such early figures as Adam Smith, John Stuart Mill and Henry Sidwick, the beginning of “proper” institutionalism in economics attributed to the first works of Thorstein Veblen.[17]
In recent studies Sven-Erik Sjöstrand considers institution “as a kind of infrastructure that facilitates – or hinders – human co-ordination and allocation of resources. Institutions thus function as a kind of rationality context, which simultaneously emerges from and governs human interactions. Consequently institutions are public goods, relevant to and shared by many, and they are in principle characterized by non-excludability. Institutions simplify action choices; they are not separate from, but part of, the individual (inter)actions. Thus, institutions not only define and delimit the set of actions available to individuals; they are simultaneously shaped by individuals and make individual interaction possible. Institutions … continuously (re)produced by individuals in their daily activities and (inter)actions on the micro level.”[18]
Different types of institutions have been described by scholars as embedded and stored in a time and space by a diverse number of means. They could be embedded in concrete empirically given organizations, establishments and forms of human activity and in the sign’s forms and ideas and concepts.
Sjöstrand pointed further that “Institutions are related to human expectations… Normative expectations, or norms, stabilize human (inter)action and make individual behaviour more predictable… Norms can be found in formal and articulated forms, as well as in forms that are more informal or tacit. Many concepts have been used by scientists to cover the whole range of possible ‘groupings’ of norms. Designations such as laws, regulations, rules, routines, conventions, traditions, customs, myths, and habits have been used. These (groupings) of norms often simultaneously express instrumental (i.e., define efficiency) and values (i.e., provide meaning).”[19] Eventually Sjöstrand defined institution as a “social construct for a coherent system of shared and enforced norms.”[20] Examples of institutions could include the family, the church, the corporation, the property rights, the university tenure, etc. However, there are many problems arise in interpreting the idea of institution. The institution is not something out there. “Rather, it is a way of subdividing the social and cultural organization of society into components meaningful to the participants in that society, and hence to observers and to analysts of the society. In a broad way institutions implies an observable arrangements of people’s affairs that contrasts with characterizations of people’ activities deriving from assumptions, intuitions, or introspections. The term also implies specificities of time and place and contrasts with universals (or general characterizations).”[21]
Economic sociologist Andrew Schotter beliefs that the creation and existence of “social institutions” directed by and connected with arisen of economic problems.[22] Richard Scott, one of the leading contributors to institutional theory and student of institutions and organizations from the sociological perspective, states that “Institutions consist cognitive, normative, and regulative structures and activities that provide stability and meaning to social behavior. Institutions are transported by various carriers – cultures, and routines – and they operate at multiple levels of jurisdiction.”[23]
Among the crucial and, at the same time, most difficult questions are the dynamics of institutional evolution and development – the emergence, reproduction and dissociation of institutions. All these questions addressed by the attempts to develop the theory of institutional change. [24] In the conclusion he just briefly mentioned the role of institutions as facilitators of “the application of reliable knowledge to the performance of the continuing activities which a community has come to regard ad significant… The application of knowledge is often primary reason for the existence of an institution and for any changes that occur in it.”[25]
We consider the environment of creation (production) and transfer of knowledge as a basic and framework reality which made possible the origins, emergence and existence of any kind of socio-cultural institutions. The deliberate intervention into complex processes of institutional evolution by the means of “institutional design,” “institutional building” and attempts of cross-national and cross-cultural “institutional transfer” became the most sophisticated fields of human activity during the XX century. As Walter Neale asserts, “An institution does not stand alone. It fits into the system of institutions, so that changing the rules of one institution means that the rules of other institutions must adapt and so change.”[26] Each institution exists in a web of different and interweaving relations with other institutions. Such a feature and “past-binding” nature of institutions lead to many difficulties in any kind of institutional changes, institutional design and institutional building. This is a vast area to study, and the transition of CEE countries provides both tremendous opportunity to build up what is desired and unprecedented challenges as well.[27] It is our strong belief that the success of transitional transformation and future development democratic and prosperity of CEE countries depends upon improvement of knowledge on the nature of institutions and techniques for their deliberate construction/modification.
Although, even though Plato in The Statesman many centuries ago presented the idea of ‘government professionals’ weaving the future with the help of knowledge, a comprehensive vision of what this means, what and how we can/should professionalize the public sector has yet to be developed.[28]
As a general framework, we probably can consider this “trend” toward professionalization as one of the crucial axis of cultural-historical development of human social activity. The professions and processes of professionalization of activity serve as a kind of bridging mechanism and a method for developing, matching and coordinating core processes of the human universe: the production-and-reproduction of activity, and transfer of culture and experience; the processes of functioning and changes and development; and the processes of organization and governance. Not everything would and should be professionalized, but certain features of human thinking have since the earliest civilizations been anticipated as “professional” and processes and passed on to those who follow.
During the last quarter of 20th century the profession become a subject of rather scrupulous analysis practically in all social sciences. The rapid and ultimate advancing of knowledge-based economy and society brought deep and practical interest in “structural and cultural understanding of the institutionalization of expertise.” [29]
However, the development of schemes and mechanisms to capture the rise of the professions were often ”the province of nostalgic amateur recollections or laudatory chronicles of progress in individual disciplines.”[30] Among the main causes of neglect of research in Europe was the dominance of basic conceptual ideas of Karl Marx and Max Weber who directed the mainstreams of scholars’ attention to concepts of social classes, power and authority, economy and bureaucratization.[31] At the same time the study of the history and socio-economic meaning of professions were among the core topics of British and American scholars. The earlier recognition of significance of the professions in twenties and thirties gave birth to the whole tradition and development of theoretical conception of profession and professionalization.[32] Professionalism as an organizing principle has been thoroughly elaborated by Harold Perkin.[33] He connected professional development with the industrial revolution and considered processes of the building of professions as crucial in British social history. An earlier studies in Britain and the USA, the existence of profession as an institution was “taken for granted” and considered not as a human creature but rather very natural to the social organization.[34] Ideologically, the professional communities with the greater meaning of professional autonomy and self-governance were seen among the basic constituencies of British and American societies and its socio-cultural reality.[35] Talcott Parsons asserted that the “professional complex … has become the most important single component in the structure of the modern societies.” [36] This vision was further supported by other prominent social scientists reflecting the advancements of recent capitalism and social constructions for its future.[37]
Profession and Professionalization in the Context of Social and Economic Re-engineering
The idea of profession and professionalization became a powerful instrument in social engineering and politics. A good example is the Thatcher Government is use of “… the ideas and actuality of professionalization as an instrument to define and improve both market morality and efficiency” in order to reorganize and privatize in a number of governmental service areas.[38] In this case the concept of profession has been used by the state “… as agents of economic surveillance and enforcers of commercial morality.” [39] The British insolvency reform of 1986 was a means to create “publicly accepted reasons” for liquidation, reorganization and privatization of unprofitable public enterprises. It also was intended to infuse basic elements of business practice to create competence and competitiveness.
By appropriating and modifying innovations advanced by Cork’s Committee, the government also set in place a complex, graduated system of sanctions.[40] The Insolvency Act can thus be seen as institutionalization of “market morality.” Moral reconstruction entailed a dual approach. The more visible efforts at professionalization, as form or modern occupational ordering, were directed at liquidators and insolvency practitioners. Coincidentally, however, the ethos of professionalization permeated discussions of business morality. In its efforts to develop and enforce ethical and practice codes, the Government consciously mimicked those features of conventional professionalization – codes of ethics, self-regulation, modes of socialization – that would be acceptably to the new enterprises. However, without exclusive control over a body of knowledge,[41] nor some capacity to restrict entry[42] this initiation of professions had severe limits.[43]
Professionalism – suitably modified to suit Thatcherite philosophy – provided a promising solution to a powerful instrumental conundrum. For the Government, a substantially professionalized enterprise offered much: (1) guarantee of minimal competence; (2) a self-regulatory apparatus to ensure proper levels of technical and moral performance; and (3) a measure of disinterestedness. Moreover, to classify an occupation as a “profession” conferred upon it the dignity and respect well institutionalized in English social life, thereby helping solve the moral deficit often associated with the market. Most important, private professions would not require government resources or administration.[44]
The creation of the British “insolvency practitioner’s profession” serves as both a good example of occupational upward mobility and an example of how different forces can be joined in the process of professionalization. It generated a new set of polymorphous professional structures.
The institutionalization of a new profession by the Insolvency Act resulted from several major factors. One of the most important was the elite insolvency practitioners themselves. The ‘Insolvency Practitioners’ Association was created in 1974. Its top strata aspired to increase its social prestige and reputation. “Professions may erect monopolies of practice, but for clients they also solve certain problems in common with governments – guarantees of competence, some hope of self-regulation, some modicum of disinterestedness. If the issue for practitioners was reputation, the principal concern of clients was competence.”[45] The civil service also welcomed a well-regulated profession in the private sector. The professionalization of insolvency practitioners created a profession to which was transferred the work of the Department of Trade. This process increased public confidence in insolvency practitioners by reinforcing their commitment to high technical and moral standards.
Among the other important features of this profession-creating activity in Britain was its unconventional organization. “Rather than the conventional fit between a single professional association and its constituent members, whose only powers are derived from the association, the new Insolvency Act created a new insolvency practitioners’ profession and endowed regulatory responsibilities on six major professional associations. Three were pre-existent accounting bodies, two were pre-existent lawyers’ bodies (the law Society and the Bar) and one was a new professional body, the Insolvency Practitioners’ Association. The seventh, and most startling addition to this regulatory pantheon, was the Government’s own Departments of Trade and Industry.”[46]
The important lessons from this case are:
· how a State can effectively employ professions to serve as agents of the State and its policy; and
· how State and profession can become a partners in such matter as a ‘trust-building’, which is crucially important for all CEE transitional societies.[47]
The case of Insolvency Act 1986 shows as well how the professionalization can serve as an effective instrument for legitimation of governmental innovations.
The professionalization of public services also can serve as a generator and primary guardian of values.[48] In the transitional context, where the shift of values appears as one of the dominant dimensions in changes in the relationships and culture of public services, the further development of processes of professionalization will facilitate and even drive changes of value system. The profession is an important “trust building” institution – an extremely crucial issue in the context of transition.
Ethics is traditionally one of the key dimensions and crucial sources for governance of professional activity and assigning norms of professional conduct.[49] As institutional and governance structures both in public and private sector become more complex and vulnerable to different kind of “market” forces and influence, it has become quite fashionable to decry the deficit of ethics in the performance of different public and private agencies. This, in turn, has generated a number of different studies on strategies to restore the ethical climate and behavior.[50] Professional and general social ethics serve as a framework, an infrastructure to keep professional activity acceptable and admissible by the professional culture and the society it serves.[51] The use of such intellectual functions and processes as reflection and human reflexivity [52] can serve as a basic foundation for ethics management, organization and governance of professional activity. According to Lefevre, one of the leading students of human reflection, the real professional is a subject, a person, “which possesses both the image of himself and the ideal of a professional.”[53] These reflective relationships are pictured here on the Figure – 1, (adapted from Lefevre, V.A. 1991). In order to keep the members of a professional community in associative, ordered and manageable relationships the profession should invent special reflective institutions which will provide them with professional values and ideals, train them to reflect through a particular prism that guides them on professionally determined subjects toward further professional development, and create particular supportive institutions which will permanently facilitate reflective exercises and both individual and collective capacity to reflect. In the CEE emerging efforts to create reflection-supporting institutions in the sphere of GPA include for example in Poland there are considerable attempts to introduce “… new structural institutions shaping the ethical infrastructure include: regulations governing the conduct of members of Parliament, as contained in the Code of Deputies' Ethics; the establishment of a system of government offices, … , which are responsible for developing ethical administrative conduct …,” [54] the development of independent, non-governmental foundations, public administration training centers and policy research agencies,[55] building professional associations such as Association of Municipal Financial Officers in Slovakia, professional media and competitions.
Among the basic institutional settings critical to modern societies, with their diverse economic, political and socio-cultural actors and heterogeneous systems of values, should be the mechanisms of trust production. The credibility problem is particularly important for the transitional societies where in the course of the 20th century the discreditation of public institutions has happened several times. Although the shift toward more public service professionalism in the 20th century can become an impediment to democratization and involvement of citizens in public policy-making, the deliberate and thorough development of complex professional institutions can enhance accountability, openness, and facilitate the development of high trust professionalism in public agencies.[56] By the building of adequate professional institutions we will support to the recreation of the entire system of credentialing in all transitional societies of CEE.
Credentialism provides a critical condition to the area of trust among modern professionals. [57] A diverse and well-engrained system of credentialing of professionalized activity has developed in the USA. There are two major types of credentialing: “occupational credentialing” and “institutional credentialing.” The occupational approach concerns individual professional and effect is realized through degrees, diplomas and certificates confirming the completion of training and education courses. Institutional credentialing involves the issued of credentials to institutions and organizations which are willing to perform professional activity at acceptable levels and to provide special services. These include chartering, operating licenses, and accreditation. Historically in the US, due to established separations and rooted patterns of relationships between the public and private sectors, private sources of credentialing are often perceived to be more valuable and important than public. [58] “Apart from state-controlled credentialing of occupations through licensing, there is an even larger system of privately controlled credentialing. Under the auspices of professions themselves, through their associations, a certificate or diploma is given to a qualified candidate, usually after having successfully completed a specified course of study and practice at an accredited professional school and often after having passed an examination.” [59]
A number of leading Western academic institutions and international professional organizations have exerted considerable effort in supporting development of professional PA in transitional countries (among them USAID, TACIS and PHARE projects of EC, SIGMA of OECD, Local Government Management Board of UK, National Association of School of Public Affairs and Administration, several private foundations, Open Society Institute network, etc.). “While the degree of influence measured by aid money is high, the success in professionalizing of public service remains limited. Part of the explanation for this may be found in the limited transposability of models of public administration from western countries to countries in transition.”[60] A major part of the transferability problem may be due to emphasis on individuals who engage in professional activity within the institutional and socio-cultural infrastructures while human behavior in the context of various CEE countries is left in the shadows.
Practically all the actions toward professionalization of PA in the CEE are built on the assumption that well-trained or re-trained public servants (e.g., by the programs such as Master’s of Public Administration) will resolve the problem of public sector transition. This approach often does not, however, fit CEE and local and national conceptions.
The history of professionalization in the U.S. has created myths, ideologies and patterns of professional activity that are bounded with a local formative context.
To simplify this extremely complex picture we suggest consideration of just four core groups: (1) the marketization of many aspects of human life and the development of institutions of American capitalism; (2) the separation of public (and non-profit) sectors and the development of state and public institutions; (3) professionalization viewed as the formation of complex institutions of reproduction and knowledge development, culture and experience; and (4) institutionstraditionally called ‘civil society’ which are independent but congruous to all others. (See Figure 2).[61]
To simplify we can use ‘market’ referred to the whole net of institutions constituted markets and its reality, the ‘state’ as referred to the net of institutions grounding governmental and state activities and reality, the ‘profession’ referred to set of institutions created the reality of processes of prefessionalization and professional relationships in a human society (with the ‘university’ as natural and integral part of it)[62] and ‘civil society’ referred to the net of different organizational settings and institutions creating civil relationships and civility. Their interaction, and ideological and structural commonalities and differences have shaped each of them and gave a birth to American patterns of professionalization and professional organization.[63] This topic deserves special research from a multidisciplinary and comparative point of view. Here we just briefly outlined some basic features, which may help in understanding what stands behind the [Anglo-] American theory of profession and the approach to professionalization of an activity in Central and Eastern Europe. Profession now is an inalienable part of American value system. The American pattern of professional activity clearly reflects and perhaps overemphasizes the meaning of ideas and spirit of ‘free enterprise’.[64]
The European “professionalization projects” (German and French) different somewhat from the Anglo-American schemes, “… notably by being attached to a broader notion of university education (akademische Bildung) than to specialized training and self-organization. Honor and status belonged more clearly to the Akademiker or the Akademische Berufe than to the professional per se. Moreover, as suggested, the development of the state was such that in many parts of Germany, notably in Prussia, it exerted a powerful influence as both the organizer of the educational system and the consumer of its products, especially those trained in law. It is not surprising that one scholar has concluded “…if in Anglo-American context the medical profession was the model for the other professions, in Germany it was, rather, the professionalized lawyer (Jurist) in the civil service.”[65]
Before the transition there were few social science studies of professions and professional organization. Nearly all of institutions of civil society were eliminated and transferred into organizations totally controlled by Communist Party. All kind of sources of power and governance were centralized in state’s hands. There were no clear distinctions between civil society and state, public and private.[66] Professional service was reduced to single and monopolistic administrative market where all professions were part of and controlled by the bureaucratic rules of party-state’s nomenklature. A closed “administrative market” of largely quasi-professional services were created within a cobweb of the party-state’s nomenklature. This practice was characterized by the absence of professional meritocracy, professional freedom, self-organization and transparency. In general the motives and spirit of professional development were lost during the soviet period. Professional careers were defined not by professional achievements but by the demonstration of strong adherence to official party slogans and behavior from one side, and by following the hidden rules of informal life and “codes of behavior” of the nomenklature.
The power of the professions as a source of high knowledge and expertise were major threat to the total-command-and-control methods of communist governance and the goal of a New Socialist Society. It was absolutely necessary to destroy and eliminate any kind of professional institutions that could produce professional culture, power and influence. Working-intelligentsia and non-qualified-labor were at the top of soviet socio-cultural priorities.[67] The result of such practice was, with the exception of the military, destruction of mechanisms for accumulation and reproduction of professional experience and culture.
The Theory: Ontological Assumptions on Profession and Professionalization
The notions of profession, professionalization and professionalism seems quite well developed (at least by the ever growing numbers of publications, professional clubs and associations, etc.) in the English-speaking world and other western European countries.[68] However, to use them instrumentally in different institutional building contexts, we need to clarify the entire ideological and ontological basis for this set of ideas and comprehend their socio-cultural background and meaning.
The profession, as a macro-institutional setting is the most complexly developed, crucial web of institutions, serves as basic mechanism of reproduction of human activity, provided accumulation of knowledge and transfer an experience, formation of culture. In our ontological model the process of reproduction must considered as a central poly-process that provides to professional activity (PA) its integrity and consistent development of the profession of GPA.
We will present the process of reproduction of GPA in the form of cycles, which provide the creation of new structures of GPA on the base of previous. The simplest case can be presented in the structure that is pictured on the Figure 3. The S ‘1’ is an initial state of structures of GPA and S ‘2’ is a final state in the cycle of reproduction processes. The ‘instruments’, ‘means’ and ‘subjects’ and ‘products of labour’ of the state of GPA are transferred to others through both, individual professionals and whole professional organizations. Such “material transfer” does not demand recreation. But it is a necessary component of processes of reproduction and provides transmission of the elements of GPA. The more complex mechanism of reproduction appear in those cases when the elements of GPA from the first state do not pass into the second state directly and do not transform into elements of the second state. They can serve only as the samples or etalons (blueprints) [E i, j] for the recreation of the same units and elements of GPA (Figure 4.) These samples and etalons have a special function in a professional universe: they capture those things that exist in the first state of GPA in a way that allows those elements to be included in the second state.
The General Theory of Activity posits that these etalons [E i, j] do not exist in the particular states of GPA, rather they move in ‘parallel’ to those states, and permanently provide recreation of all of the structures of GPA.[69] Examples include written statements of standards, specifications for procedures, written rules which guide behavior in a particular professional position, codes of professional ethics, organizational and administrative charts of professional agencies, etc.[70] These relations are pictured on the Figure 5.
Critical to this discourse is distinction between the two spheres of GPA production and culture.. Culture here is aggregate of all means that recreate social, socio-cultural and production structures of GPA. An indispensable condition for this kind of reproduction is activity itself. The samples and etalons will perform their functions only if there is a person who will be able to create, by those etalons, new artifacts, which are included in new (reproduced) structures of GPA. Such a process of translation is possible in only case if GPA will be continuously transfers in parallel. How is this possible?
The most simplified form of translation of GPA is the transferring of professionals from one socio-production structure to another. But this is not reproduction of GPA as such. A more complex situation arises in a case where the real task is to reproduce certain elements of GPA. The activities of exemplary professionals and recognized professional institutions inevitably become the sample, the cultural artifact for this process. They secure and transfer particular features and construction of GPA. Examples here include such institutions as professional schools, with their core curricula and professional textbooks, research methods and theories, cases and canonized patterns of professional view of the world, structures of internal organization and culture,[71] and professional roles as research, teaching, administration, etc.
In any case, the recreation of GPA is only possible when certain people – fellow members of professional community - are able and willing to perform this activity. They can duplicate the GPA of previous generations or recreate it by inherited products and signs. Historically, the transmission of such abilities is provided by training and education.
These models and conceptions, developed within the theory of profession, allow a thorough analysis and definition of crucial reproducing elements and components of the socio-cultural and economic organization of GPA, and as well as general framework to better understand nature and structure of the institutional setting of GPA.
A dynamic view of profession can be seen dynamically as three integrated dimensions:
· The dimension of pure thinking - a set of patterns, schemes of thinking and core objects and theories developed and employed by the profession and characterized by its specific, subjects – see position 1 in Figure 7.. This dimension is drives by the laws and logic of theories and ideal objects.
· The communication dimension – a set of socially and culturally organized communication patterns used by the profession within and outside of professional community – see position # 2 in Figure 7 and symbol of communication sent and received.
· The behavioral dimension - patterns of professional actions and behavior: socially, culturally and technologically determined professional performance – see position # 3 in Figure 7, “à” symbolizes an action).
All of these belts differ by internal nature and logic of development. They are relatively autonomous, however, as integral functions of particular professional activity. But they are coherent and complementary to each other as systems of profession and professional organization of activity.
The communication dimension is at the core of this scheme and the construction of the profession. It performs a critical function in establishing and maintaining all types of relationships with the outside professional, social and business world. Communication provides systems integrity and coordinated professional life both within the profession and with other professional communities, state and international institutions and the rest of societal universe.
Each of these dimensions can evolve by its speed, logic and laws. This can caused internal discrepancies, resulted in restructuring, disconnecting and destroying of performance of separate institutions within the profession, as well as between activities of particular professions and the rest of universe. Among the examples here can be: the compartmentalization of ASPA which is now comprises of 112 chapters each of those tend to become single “truly professional unit” and create own ASPA-like association; the complicated relations between certified public accounting professional associations (American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, American Accounting Association), big professional partnerships and state regulation agencies (Security and Exchange Commission, Federal Accounting Standards Board) over accounting and auditing standards and procedures, code of ethics and professional responsibility; situations of conflicting interests between public agency policy elites and public service professionals; an example of interprofessional controversy can be conflict between lawyers and accountants during 1940s and 1950s “… on the question of who was to be legally constitutes to engage in certain areas of tax work and related consulting.”[72] ; In order to prevent such destructive consequences, there are special functions, which can help to keep multi-process of professionalization and professional development in systems integrity. [73]
In Figure 7 these reflective functions/positions are numbers 4, 5, 6.[74] These reflective functions allow professionals to reflect and benchmark current professional developments, design and implement necessary changes, and restructure their professional institutions and organizations. Reflective meta-position # 7 (P) in Figure 7 is “responsible” for the monitoring and observation of development of profession as a whole. And finally, the reflective meta-positions # 8 (S) in Figure 7 coordinate the adaptation and development of the profession within the broader socio-cultural and economic universe.[75]
The aim here is to stabilize the professional heritage and achievements, status and integrity within the social system and network of other professions, non-professional institutions and organizations. By this holistic reflection of professional performance the profession can stabilize or change its own structure and network of professional institutions, can redesign principle directions of professional activity, can support or provoke changes of basic values and core knowledge, and can enhance skills and patterns of activity.
Moreover, all of these reflective functions are responsible for accumulation of professional knowledge and culture, and reproduction of professional activity. This occurs through the experience and lessons of current practice and history (own and others), by creation of appropriate standards and norms, and education and development of the professions human capital.
A critical message of this construct is that we should not expect any appropriate development and prospering of GPA without building an integrated professional infrastructure.. It must be adequate both to its history and current socio-cultural situation, and capable of supporting and performing of all the functions that are discussed above.
The results of activity of reflective positions 4 through 7 are reflected in the work of A. B. Knox. He believes that each these profession possess own cognitive structure and higher level conceptions that serve as “… meta-components and are used by experts to reflect on combinations of knowledge and experiences.” [76]
All types of academic activity, teaching and learning, studies and research, and proper professional practice represent different combinations of positions 1 through 7 or some of modification of these functions/positions. For example, new research findings or results of theoretical developments towards improvement of current professional activity may be channeled into practice through involvement of certain actors into processes of reflective observation, critical assessment and learning
or un-learning. Possible trajectories of such processes include the following positions: 1–5–3; 1–4–3 and 1–6–3 or even more complex: 1–6–7–5; 1–6–7–4–3; 1–5–7–4–3; 1–7–3; 1–7–2; 1–7–1–2 and so forth.
Hopefully, therefore, this scheme can serve an instrument in research and design of almost any kind of professional institutions. A robust, well-established profession will possess a set of institutions and agencies which will support or perform the movements through these lines of professional activity and professional development. Such dynamic process of professionalization means that the profession will gradually master and develop own specific institutional infrastructure capable of pursuing all of these processes.
To introduce some kind of innovations into current professional practice – through implementation at position # 3 – it may be necessary to take certain professional agents “out” of routine practice and involve them in the professional reflection, learning and communications.. This might include job rotations, new assignments within organizational and functional structures, peer reviews, performance assessments and professional competitions. Externally, it would include professional meetings, special tasks and focus groups comprised of different professional positions and invited representatives of other professions and so on.
It is impossible to expect the accommodation of new ideas and schemes of performance, developed by scholars, without the reflection of real practice gained through communication with and learning from all of the stakeholders of a profession. Thus, in order to be able to introduce any innovations, professions must develop associations and institutions, which facilitate complex poly-processes of reflection, communication and learning.
As Rusaw, states “Professional associations provide
(1) formal and informal matrices for developing knowledge, attitudes, values, and effective techniques for practice,
(2) new frames of thinking, feeling, reflecting, and experiencing, and
(3) roles as an authority, facilitator, and arbitrator of knowledge for change.” [77]
By using their institutional networks professional communities can enhance their expertise and skill development through formally organized meetings, conferences, workshops, and seminars. The identification of common problems, themes, issues and priorities can serve as an approach for uniting efforts of academics, practicing managers, and others positions for the development of professional practice and the identification of their profession as a socio-cultural formation.[78] Professional associations also create unique frames of reference and an opportunistic environment that predisposes professionals to reflect, define and react to phenomenon they have experienced. Such a reflection creates new meanings, which then transforms into new knowledge, ideas, etc. [79]
This “dynamic reflection” is absolutely necessary for “sense-making” in professional activity. The sense-making process is supported by continuous in-professional and inter-professional reflective conversations and discussions. Through these discussions professionals articulate their visions, assumptions, and conceptions, and predispositions towards professional acting by creating meta-frameworks of meaning. Such an activity enables the members of profession to re-examine their dominant beliefs, values, and practices against critical situations and adapt to an ever changing environment. The process of articulation and translation of these experience-frameworks to newcomers is critical to reproduction and development of profession. It is a core process for creation and definition of professional culture.
In short, as illustrated in positions 1–8, the innovative capacity and proper performance of a profession depends on development of a network of professional institutions and associations which can serve as an infrastructure for articulating, channeling, directing and supporting of flows of knowledge, expertise, and reflection.
Professional associations also provide such important functions as continuous learning and socialization. “Socialization refers to the formal and informal learning processes by which professionals come to know, accept, and share with others expectations of individual and group performance, opportunities for personal and professional growth and advancement, and interpersonal relationships inside and outside a particular organizational context.”[80]
As case examples in GPA of the institutionalization of learning and socialization consider such U.S. organizations as the National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA), American Society for Public Administration (ASPA), National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration (NASPAA) and their component associations, journals, institutionalized networks of research, competitions, and awards for recognition programs. ASPA was established 60 years ago with the overall mission “to professionalize the public service, to keep members on the cutting edge of good government, and to help answer the enduring question of how to make government work better. Over the years the Society has played a major role in achieving these ends.”[81]
The Dangers of Professionalization:
Professionalism, Administrative Bureaucracy and Building of Institutions of Modern Governments
For better or worse – or better and worse – much of our government is in the hands of professionals
(Frederick Mosher)
There are several competing theoretical approaches on danger of professionalization and role of professional bureaucracy in public administration and governance.[82] The views of professionalization of public administration as ground for “bureaucratization” and the danger of over-towered bureaucratic machinery to democracy were expressed as by Max Weber as major revolutionary leaders of XX century.[83] The danger of creating of “professional state” and “bureaucratic state” also studied by a number of public administration theorists.[84] Recently some key pros and cons issues of professionalism and professional bureaucracy in modern public administration and governance developed by leading American scholars.[85] Fred Riggs asserts that professionalization increases power of public administration bureaucrats, so they tend to act against constitutional systems and pose serious threats to democracy.[86]
The problems of functional and ethical interrelations and interactions of politicians and professional public administrators, traditionally considered in the framework of old dichotomy of democratically elected politicians vs. professional administrators, are among the most viable in American public administration literature.[87] Bert A. Rockman calls attention to a clash between “accountability,” “responsiveness,” and “responsibility” of public service professionals.[88] In fact public service professional bounded by at least three different types and often conflicting rationalities: by the principle of accountability which reflects commitment to the law, by the principle of responsibility reflected adherence to professional ethics and knowledge base, and finally by the principle of responsiveness that represents commitment to requirements of political leadership and chain of command in administrative machinery – see Figure 8. [89] The art of being professional is based on skillful fulfillment of requirements of all of them. But it is unrealistic to expect such skillful performance without development of proper professional institutions.[90]
The successful solving of problems depends on institutional settings in all dimensions presented in Figure 8. We believe that the most practical and efficient approach to overcome these tensions and discrepancies will be to think political constituent (dimension) of sphere of GPA as an open and problems oriented and forward attention and actions on building and reinforcement of institutions supporting further professionalization.[91]
The evolution of laws and administrative machineries construction as well as political leaderships both move in its own time, and their efficacy and cultural-historical contextual appropriateness depends on professional GPA.[92] As an important direction of institutional development should be the professional standardization of public executive activities. Institutions of professional education are crucial channel to intervene into these developments. Education can serve as the best channel to instill in professional public administrators “a philosophy of public service which is both consistent with and supportive of democracy.”[93]
Frederick C. Mosher was among the first scholars deeply analyzed professionalism issue in government and public administration. As he argues, public services professionals can narrowly define and establish own frameworks for their professional expertise for each field of knowledge. This can cause parochialism and inability to recognize anything beyond the certain assumptions.[94]
Technical rationality, as a way of thinking/organization of life with the belief into ongoing technical progress, serves as one of the main contributors in emerging and development of modern professions and processes of professionalization.[95] Technical rationality approach causes on development of modern highly specialized expertise and compartmentalization of knowledge. It is a “lifeblood” of any modern professional, and a source for the proliferation of professional associations in the Western world since the mid of nineteen century. Technical rationality grounds specialized expert knowledge and legitimizes social status, autonomy and control of practice of the professions.[96]
The reverse side of specialization and compartmentalization of professional knowledge is contextless and timeless approach to practice. It is caused on the “… lack of historical consciousness across the professions and disciplines.”[97] The little understanding of broad socio-cultural, historical and political context characterizes professional practice nurtured by strict technical rationality. By this approach, “Human action is to be explained through the development of general laws and models independent of time and space. There is, in this view, no need to include history and culture in accounts of human behavior.”[98]
The compartmentalization of knowledge and specialization of expertise complicated communication, cooperation and organization of activity of public administration. It leads to complex uneasy working relationships between individual organizational units, projects, individual professionals and single actions of public agencies – see Figure 9.
As we proposed in the model on Figure 7 (and in dynamic view Figure 10), in order to overcome these consequences of subjected specialization the profession have to develop institutions which will support reflection over different modes and dimensions of professional practice – positions 7 and 8 in Figure 7. Reflection itself (see Figure 7) can’t provide integration and unite dispersed specialized modes of professional activity. The reflective exercises have to be channeled into redesign and institutional rearrangement of profession and its individual units – positions 1 – 4 in Figure 8. Among the crucial conditions for reflective-ability of professional institutions is “moral competence” which discussed in the theory of reflective responsibility develop by Philip Selznick. As he beliefs, “The great task of institutional design is to build moral competence into the structure of the enterprise. This is the key to corporate responsibility – private as well as public.”[99]
Among other dangers are so called phenomenon of professional rent-seeking behavior and attempts to gain monopolistic privilege to provide particular services and perform special practice. The economists were among most sharp critics of professionalism and emphasized monopolistic practice of professional associations.[100] Bob Coats includes into negative features of professionalism such characteristics as “rigidity, conformity, resistance to innovations (other than those of an proved species), the maintenance of tight disciplinary boundaries, the exclusion and/or denigration of dissenters, and excessively centralized control over access to resources, training and development opportunities. It is pertinent to note that professional standards, like methodological rules, have prescriptive and regulative as well as cognitive functions, and the quest for scientific truth or community service can easily be sacrificed to the interests of maintaining and advancing special privileges, securing higher remuneration, and protecting the field from encroachments by charlatans and those operating in closely related or overlapping disciplines or occupations.”[101]
Professions as well often become too hierarchical and elitist, with domination of some sort of orthodox leading figures which centered in a few institutions (for example such as Chicago school and their associates in economics). Such a professional establishment could control the selection of professionals on academic posts, officers of the national associations, the editors and board members of field’s publications and major professional magazines, the winners of the professional awards, and allocation of research grants, recruitment of professionals for important governmental positions, etc.
By controlling the contents and changes in curriculum, the means of certification of programs of graduate schools and approaches to assessment of professional performance these élite circles can determine the processes of renovation of the profession and the entry and career development of new recruits. However, although the “professional inertia” precludes changes and innovations, it serves as means to secure professional culture, integrity and identity, and as an overall mechanism of societal stability and even contribution to “international order.”[102] The most crucial here are institutions and networks of professional communication – the heterogeneity, clear framing and well-institutionalized professional media and robust intra-professional democracy will define this balance between processes of reproduction and development of profession.
Figure 10 attempts to capture the central stages of professional development in a single graphic. Positions 1 and 2 represent the processes of transfer from retrospective reflection on past situations and professional actions as well as design of future professional work and its organization. This process supported by different types of multi-facetal and multilevel channels for professional experience packaging and transfer. Positions 1–3 represent the results of retrospective reflection within an actual body of professional culture, including knowledge, norms, standards, blueprints, etc. Positions 3–3’ contribute to procedures of cultural selection and knowledge building. The results of these procedures positions 4–4’ symbolize new knowledge accumulation and application and futuristic reflection - position 2. Each of the arrows in Figure 8 should be considered as symbol of particular process within the life of profession and as a vital element of organization of the profession of GPA. Each element should have corresponding institutions.
This scheme can serve as a map for designing projects and other initiatives for the revitalization and recreation of key functions and institutions of professional organization of public administration in CEE. We can study history, learn, which institutions actually exist, identify gaps and develop strategies to revitalize new and old units and activities.
Clearly, one of the core reasons for institutional chaos and failures in institution building in the CEE is the absence of professions and mechanisms for professionalization and the accumulation of experience and culture of public administration. Professionalization of public administration in transitional post-soviet countries must be considered in a complex, multi institutional context.
Key actors and participants for professionalization in CEE countries must include:
1. Citizens;[103]
2. National and local governments of OECD countries;
3. National and local governments of CEE countries;
4. States institutions and professions;
5. International non-governmental civil organizations;
6. National and local non-governmental civil organizations;
7. National and local entrepreneurial organizations;
8. Individual transnational institutional entrepreneurs;
9. Transnational business corporations;
10. Local businesses;
11. Public administration scholars and practitioners with transnational and global professional interests;
12. Business management development scholars and practitioners with transnational and global professional interests;
13. Public administration (and management) schools and departments in Western universities;
14. Mass media and professionally oriented media organizations;
15. International and national professional associations for public administration; and
16. Public administration consultants.[104]
Equally critical is a professional institutional infrastructure which includes:
1. Accoutrements of professional life and activity: for the articulation and dissemination of professional ideology, mission, values and behavior, symbols, rituals and codes of ethics.[105]
2. Communication networks: sharing of a common professional vocabulary such as journals, WWW, newsletters, bulletins, etc.
3. Professional knowledge generation and development: institutions which provide basic paradigms through both applied and theoretical research and thereby increasing the field’s intellectual capital and its dissemination through publication and consulting activities.
4. Benchmarking and professional performance evaluation: opportunities for competition and recognition, peer review, country-wide and trans-regional sharing of standards for performance and development.
5. Entry level and life-long professional education and training: formal on-site and distance programs at universities, academies and institutes and less formal programs from professional societies and associations, media, and publications.
6. Professional integrity and identity enhancement: annual conferences, special meetings, honorary societies, awards, histories, etc.
7. Promotional efforts: lectures and educational materials for students and teachers in K–12; inclusion of high school and undergraduate students in professional conferences.
8. Public policy advocacy: visible, public position–taking on issues and events affecting public servants and the public service.
“True professionals” then are those members of the GPA community who capable of and committed to delivering valuable contributions into at least three dimensions of the profession:
1. Into the processes of changing existing professional values and ideology and employment of professional knowledge and culture;
2. Into the processes of intergenerational transfer of professional culture and reproduction of professional activity; and finally,
3. Into the processes of accumulation of professional experience, enrichment and renovation of professional knowledge and improvement of professional standards.
Naturally all these processes possess particular social and economic dimensions. The “true public professional” performs such activity by “marketing” their commitment to public service and fitting their professional institutions into its societal universe, cooperating with other institutions and reinforcing social status and cultural meaning of professional activity within the entire society.[106]
“Professional reality” provokes reflection and lead to changes of attitudes, skills development and reshape an overall frames of mind and activity. Through exposure to diverse views from many local and international professional contexts, members of professional communities can create a different set of concepts and norms from those developed by particular local public administration agencies.
The advancement of communication technology at the end of 20th century creates absolutely new reality and tremendous opportunities for transnational exchanges and communication in the field of public administration. These possibilities to share and promote common needs, interests, and values can stimulate professionals collectively to develop new cultural and learning frameworks. Professional associations in transitional countries by this involvement into international professional communication and development may enable members collectively to reconstruct local organizations “… whose values conflict with professionally held ones through advocacy, public relations, and lobbying.”[107] They can develop “policy statements through special committees, focus groups and task forces, and can call for adoption of work process reforms and ethical codes” of public administration, or promote “enforcement of rules, regulations and laws.”[108]
As discussed, the recreation and development of institutions for reflection and communication are key elements of professionalization and development of public management. International collaboration, thanks it comparison–reflection–thought provoking nature, is plays extremely important role in professionalization and professional development of public management in post-soviet countries. The spirit and motives of professional development of top public managers can be enhanced by the international experiences and facilitation of a transparent and articulated institutional environment. It can help to develop such crucial devices as professional competitions and international recognition of professional achievements. Comparative analysis could also help to find path through which current professional experience and expertise can be modified and adapted to other professional activities.
The transitional situation of the CEE countries offers a unique opportunity for deliberate intervention into the processes of formation and development of professions and their institutional infrastructure. But, this situation has exposed both the advantages as well as deficiencies of conceptions developed during last century. On the other hand, it provides an opportunity to reflect broader historical and socio-cultural processes and phenomenon and to build a more holistic and complex structure of the reality of institutional building and professionalization. As has been said, if you like to understand some kind of complex social phenomena - try to change it! The necessity for fundamental change and the opportunity to deliberately build basic elements of social organization provides a meaningful challenge for theoretical reflection and deepening of our understanding.
The professionalization of the extremely complex sphere of GPA is far from complete. There are underdeveloped institutions for knowledge-building, research and consulting activities; institutions for such crucial services as an executive education, dissemination of information and publications; the lack of links and partnership with emerging NGO’s, new relationships with the private sector, etc. Throughout the CEE institutional settings appropriate for these new realities are not yet formed. [109]
There is much to be done future research should provide:
1. A comprehensive conception of profession and processes of professionalization of GPA in the modern world.
2. A history of complex, interconnected web of socio-cultural and economic institutions supporting professional development and professionalism.
3. Maps and a structured and operationalized vision of modern institutional infrastructure of professional GPA.
4. Mechanisms and conditions of formations and development of professional institutions of GPA.
5. Enhanced opportunities and mechanisms for international collaboration for the professionalization of GPA in CEE.
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