The Irish state established upon independence in 1922 was a parliamentary democ- racy, its law based on common law and legislation enacted by the parliament under the constitution. The main features of Bunreacht na hEireann, 1937 (replacing the constitution of the Irish Free State in 1922), included the republican and unitary nature of the state, separation of powers, and a bicameral legislature (the Oireach- tas), which is composed of an upper house whose role in the legislative process is quite restricted (Seanad Éireann) and a lower house (Dáil Eireann), together with the government and independent court system. The head of government is the Tao- iseach, and the head of state is the president, who is elected by the people every seven years. The influence of British tradition was evident in that the parliament, government, and bureaucracy were consciously modeled on British institutions.7
The politico-administrative system was an extremely centralized one whereby the system was based on a strong central executive with subordinate local authori- ties answerable to and financially dependent on the center. The lack of attention to reform of subnational government continued for decades, and it was not until fol- lowing a referendum in 1999 that a constitutional provision for local government was included in Bunreacht na hEireann.
In the years following the establishment of the state, numerous administra- tive demarcations were created for functions such as health, tourism, and regional development, but they became an unwieldy and poorly coordinated network of agencies both within and between the network of local authorities. This has prompted descriptions of a “jungle of administrative areas”8 that was inefficient
and unfathomable to the ordinary citizen. One of the ironies of this administrative complexion is that clientelismiii is a distinctive characteristic of the Irish political culture, and local politics, therefore, have a distinct impact on the centralized state despite the emphasis on ultra viresiv and weak subnational influence.
The Irish civil service is small by European standards, and approximately 20,663 officials were serving in the main general service grades on December 31, 2003 (see Table 5.1). It is a career system whereby the engagement of higher civil servants in politics is forbidden. The statutory position with regard to recruitment and regula- tion was governed by the Civil Service Commissioners Act 1956, amended recently by the Public Service Management (Recruitment and Appointments) Act 2004.
Another distinctive feature of the Irish system is ministerial responsibility, which was embodied in the Ministers and Secretaries Act of 1924, providing the statutory classification of functions of government under departments of state.
Each government minister is in charge of a specific department and is constitution- ally responsible for the administration of that department. The minister in charge of each department was designated a “corporation sole,” meaning that he or she could sue and be sued as the corporate entity rather than as an individual.9 From a legal point of view, the civil service was seen to play a subservient role; thus parlia- mentary control of the civil service has been indirect in nature, occurring through the ministers and the government. This system has clearly had a major impact on the way in which the civil service does its work and has bred an overly cautious
Table 5.1 Main Civil Service Grades as of December 31, 2003 (Whole-Time Equivalents)
Grade Number
Secretary general 17.00
Deputy general 3.00
Assistant secretary 134.00
Principal 591.35
Assistant principal 1,674.58 Administrative officer 237.05 Higher executive officer 2,762.18 Executive officer 3,805.02
Staff officer 1,323.10
Clerical officer 10,115.34
Total 20,662.62
Source. Adapted from Institute of Public Administration (IPA) Yearbook and Diary, 2007.
approach aimed in particular at ensuring that the minister is not embarrassed by civil service decisions or actions.10 Instead of being preoccupied with broad ques- tions of policy making, ministers therefore became burdened with matters of detail, and it is unsurprising that managerial accountability has been weak and dealt with internally within the departmental hierarchy and that civil servants are rarely held to publicly account for their actions or inactions.11
Until the mid-1990s, several ad hoc reforms took place, but the system adopted upon independence remained largely intact. The first significant reform initiative, the Devlin Report, was presented in 1969 following major changes in economic planning that occurred in the wake of the publication of the influential Minister for Finance T. K. Whitaker’s Economic Development (1958) and implementation of the first five-year development program in the 1960s. The Public Services Organisa- tion Review Group (PSORG or Devlin Committee) (1969) questioned the capacity of the Irish administration to cope with the demands of an increasingly industrial and urban society. It analyzed the issue of political control and delegation in terms of the burden of administrative work falling upon ministers and higher civil ser- vants, and provided an overall blueprint for change.
In particular, the Devlin Report diagnosed two defects in public administra- tion—inadequate emphasis on policy making and lack of coordination within the civil service as a whole. This report was not implemented, however, and reform was not taken up again until the mid-1980s, when a White Paper, Serving the Country Bet- ter (1985), emphasized the necessity to change the administrative process and invoke more attention to management principles and value for money. Although these ideas were popular, they were shelved, as in the late 1980s reform became associated with reducing the size of the civil service in a period of fiscal rectitude to the neglect of structural and operational improvements.
The establishment of the modern Irish state and the experience of administra- tive reform until the 1990s reflected a system, therefore, that remained steeped in British practice, rigid in organization and method, and demonstrated a pragmatic policy style. It may therefore be stressed that the characteristics of the existing political and administrative systems act as shaping influences over processes of management change.12 The central government organized into departments struc- tured along sectorally differentiated lines, and the weak subnational government system together produced an administration that served the public relatively well but within which operational deficiencies and a lack of interdepartmental coor- dination existed. Senior officials did not cultivate an elite cadre, as in the case of the British civil service with its Oxbridge tradition, and the conservative political and religious circumstances of the new state affected the nature of public policy decision making. The nature of the relationship between politicians and the civil service had the effect that the civil service was largely its own keeper with regard to administrative reform and, as a consequence, it resisted change.13