Review article
Public Administration and Political System in Estonia: Finding the Balance between Managerial Reforms and Good Governance
Jasmina Džinić
orcid.org/0000-0003-3927-6875
; Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb
Abstract
The organisation and functioning of the public administration in Estonia are analysed. After a short overview of the historical development of the state and administration characterised by the constant fight for independence, the author has dealt with the current public administration system and administrative reforms that have been implemented in Estonia since 1991. The paper analyses legal regulation of the relationship between political bodies and public administration as well as the centre of government characterized by certain specificities of generally traditional parliamentary government system. Within the chapter on political, administrative, and fiscal decentralization, the author has described the complex territorial organization, the bodies of local units, the scope of their activities, and fiscal decentralization guaranteed by law, but weakly implemented in practice. The bodies of state administration and public service providers are described and enumerated in the paper. The main features of the civil service system relate to a narrow scope of public administration employees with special status, decentralization, and broad implementation of performance-related pay. The implementation of the first phase of administrative reforms had been based on managerial ideas of efficiency founded on liberalization and privatization, whereas the reforms conducted before the EU accession were oriented towards better relations between administration and citizens. The less successful reforms have been implemented in the field of territorial organization and political decentralization.
Keywords
public administration – Estonia; state administration; decentralization; civil service system; administrative reform
Hrčak ID:
139231
URI
Publication date:
18.3.2015.
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