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Even before the United States entered the “Great War” in 1917, President Woodrow Wilson wanted to change the world. He sought a way for nations to join together to guarantee a permanent peace. In 1796, President George Washington set the course for American foreign policy by cautioning the new nation “to steer clear of permanent alliances.” This isolationist policy reflected Washington’s desire to keep the United States out of Europe’s frequent wars. In 1823, the Monroe Doctrine warned the Europeans against establishing any new colonies or interfering in the affairs of independent nations in the Western Hemisphere. It also reaffirmed that the U.S. would stay out of Europe’s alliances and wars except when American rights were threatened. In the 19th century, the United States expanded. Through the Louisiana Purchase, the acquisition of Florida, negotiations for Oregon, the annexation of Texas, the Mexican War, the Gadsden Purchase, and the Indian Wars, the nation grew. By the turn of t...

Former Indian Ambassador to US Nirupama Rao has been appointed as a public policy fellow to a Washington-based think-tank where she will work on a project on the Sino-India ties. Rao will be affiliated with the Wilson Centre's Asia programme.  Former Indian Ambassador to US Nirupama Rao has been appointed as a public policy fellow to a Washington-based think-tank where she will work on a project on the Sino-India ties, a top American think-tank has said.Rao will be affiliated with the Wilson Centre’s Asia programme and spend three months in residence at the Wilson Centre, a key non-partisan policy forum for tackling global issues, beginning in June 2017.“She will be working on a book project on the Indo-China relationship and will be contributing to the Wilson Centre’s activities in India, including its India in Asia Initiative,” the Wilson Centre said. The 66-year-old former Indian diplomat was India’s first woman ambassador to China and its first woman spokesperson for the Mi...

Woodrow Wilson’s venerated but dubious foreign policy has exhausted its moral core. What to make of an American president who proclaims that “the principle of public right must henceforth take precedence over the individual interests of particular nations”? The imperative mood, the unqualified generalisation, the moral grandiloquence: these are the rhetorical habits of American imperialism. Though the statement was uttered nearly a century ago by President Woodrow Wilson, it echoes the evangelism of George W. Bush: “Freedom is the non-negotiable demand of human dignity.” US President Donald Trump represents the demise of this venerable, dubious legacy. Challenged about his respect for Vladimir Putin despite Putin’s use of violent political repression, Trump once replied, “There are a lot of killers. You think our country’s so innocent?” This exhaustion of moral self-belief has found a material form in Trump’s recently proposed budget, which would slash diplomacy, bulk up the military...

Pointing that 20 per cent of public sector enterprises still do not have a woman director and around 90 per cent of them do not have the required number of independent directors, Sebi chairman emphasised on the need for improved corporate governance practices at listed PSUs. Pulling up public sector undertakings for not complying with corporate governance norms, Sebi chairman Ajay Tyagi on Monday called for similar rules for both public and private sector firms and said that there should no preferential treatment of state owned companies. Speaking at an event organised by Standing Conference of Public Enterprises (SCOPE), a professional organisation representing central government public enterprises, Tyagi said that having different norms for listed public and private firms might be “perceived wrongly”. While the PSUs are required to meet the 25 per cent public float norm by August 2017, there have been suggestions from certain quarters of the government that the deadline should be ...

There should be a system of annual recruitment into the IAS of mid-career professionals from diverse sectors. Few issues in civil service reform arouse more passion and acrimony than lateral entry into the Indian Administrative Service (IAS). It is talked about, off and on, both within the government and outside, but has not been acted upon. We believe it is an idea whose time has not only come, but one which is overdue. The case for lateral entry is strong. First, the IAS has been designed for the pre-reform India of a dominant state. The logic of economic reforms that began in 1991 is for the state to yield space to the market; as we deepen reforms, it becomes even more imperative for the government to understand the impact of its policies on stakeholders — the private sector, the non-government sector and the larger public. The IAS officers, on the other hand, see the government only from within. Sure, there are efforts to reach out to the stakeholders, but is that an adequate sub...

Democracy is about numbers. Yet a democratic government must address each citizen. There is a village named Inroak/Chinlak in Nancowry tehsil, Nicobar district of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. It is unusual because the Census 2011 tells us this village has only one resident. Sparse populations are normal in that part of the country. East Island village in Diglipur (North and Middle Andaman district) has 16 residents. The numbers may not be as low as this, but villages with small populations (say, less than 200) are found in other parts of the country too. The aggregate of such villages is around 90,000, with large numbers concentrated in Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh. Over time, such villages disappear; they grow uninhabited. Residents migrate to larger villages. What is the government’s responsibility? We may quibble about the definition of core public goods and services. Whatever be the definition, it is the governm...

Lateral exit is as important as lateral entry in improving performance and efficiency.Many young IAS officers often fall prey to the incompetency of the framework. Once inducted, postings and training seem to turn them into generalists rather than specialists. An examination that attracts over 7,50,000 aspirants and selects only 0.15 per cent is sure to be the most competitive in the world. India’s civil services examination carefully selects the most fertile minds in order to turn them into ideal bureaucrats. This is not to say that those who do not write the exam, based on their choice, are less bright. However, the Peter Principle — the rise to higher levels of incompetence — applies to many employees. Thus, lateral exit, too, is equally important. Many young IAS officers often fall prey to the incompetency of the framework. Once inducted, postings and training seem to turn them into generalists rather than specialists. The training does not appear to focus on domain expertise an...

Special constitutional provisions make the Delhi LG’s office more powerful, but if Bedi chooses to be difficult, there is little that the Puducherry govt can do. Then Puducherry Lt Governor (LG) Kiran Bedi claimed that the powers of a Lieutenant Governor of a Union Territory are different from that of a state, that she could choose to overlook the Legislature “depending on how compelling are the circumstances”, and that she would “correct mistakes in the Budget” for the coming year, she was not lying — she can, however, be accused of vastly overstating her powers. [The LG spoke to The Indian Express, ‘Bedi says need not consult Cabinet, will have a say in Budget’, print edition of January 10, 2017, online at http://bit.ly/2iX9wmv%5D The powers of the LG of Puducherry are different from the ones of the LG of Delhi, the other UT that has an elected legislature and government. The LG of Delhi has “Executive Functions” that allow him to exercise his powers in matters connected to public ...

Edited excerpts of the speech that was to be delivered at the Indian Institute of Public Administration, Mumbai, on April 4 by former Union Home Secretary Madhav Godbole . I have deliberately framed the question so as not to restrict it to “India as a secular state”. For, I believe, it is not enough if the Indian state is secular, which it is not. It is equally, if not more, important that we are a secular society, a secular nation. I believe this question needs to be asked, reflected upon and answered truthfully. My latest book, Secularism — India At Cross-Roads, on this subject is under print. It is my conviction that India’s survival as a multireligious, multilingual, multiracial, multicultural society will depend on how successful it is in working its secularism. No society can prosper or be at peace with itself if one-fourths of its population feels neglected, deprived and unwanted. It is disconcerting to see that, in recent times, serious questions are being raised about India’...

Delhi government’s Outcome Budget is a unique effort towards accountability.Delhi’s Outcome Budget document was released last week and gives several reasons to believe why this claim might be true. Presenting his third budget for the Delhi government last month, the Finance Minister, Manish Sisodia, also unveiled Delhi’s Outcome Budget for 2017-18 calling it “an historic innovation for ushering in transparency and accountability in public spending”. Delhi’s Outcome Budget document was released last week (bit.ly/2nXohrX) and gives several reasons to believe why this claim might be true. Public administration in India has been plagued by a lack of focus on results and outcomes that matter most to citizens. Annual planning and monitoring revolves largely around the allocation of the government’s budget to its departments and programmes and periodically checking if the money is being spent and activities completed. “Did they do it?” is the operative question to judge performance — did th...

By allowing Overseas Indian Citizens to appear for UPSC exams, government could broaden the pool for recruitment. A recent government decision has the potential to blur the difference between public and private recruitment. All public recruitment agencies [UPSC, Staff Selection Commission (SSC), Railway Recruitment Board (RRB), RBI, armed forces, paramilitary, public sector banks, public sector enterprises] will use the Ministry of Labour and Employment’s NCS (National Career Service) portal to disclose scores/rankings of candidates in the final stages of recruitment processes. Courtesy NIC, there will thus be an integrated information system for public recruitment agencies. This will have all the details about a candidate. As a candidate, when I fill out an application form, I have the option of opting out of the disclosure scheme. If not, my data are there on the portal for other private and public sector agencies to use. As an applicant, I may have got through to final stages, but...

Public policy requirements of the 21st century demand a bureaucracy less generalist. In 1921, a Harvard medical school professor, Lawrence Henderson, wrote that medicine had crossed a “great divide” because “for the first time in human history a random patient with a random disease consulting a doctor at random stands a better than 50/50 chance of benefiting from the encounter”. In other words, knowledge, complexity and evidence in medicine had advanced to a point where it was better to be treated by physicians than to run in fear of them. India stands at a similar “great divide”: Generalists are more dangerous than specialists and the rising standards of human capital in public policy areas — education, healthcare, public finance, urbanisation — means we must stop equating bureaucrats with technocrats. The most complex decision for any entrepreneur — social or business — is choosing between generalists and specialists because, as the American politician Mario Cuomo said, “You campai...

The Supreme Court has held that guidelines are not binding and are not law, therefore, whether they were followed should be reviewed under procedures within the government, not by the CBI or a criminal court. When there is no element of criminality, how does a public servant defend a governmental decision in a criminal court? There is no apparent evidence in the chargesheets filed against Harish Gupta of “quid pro quo”, mens rea (criminal intent) or meeting of minds to commit an illegal act to make his decisions a criminal offence. In seven cases, the CBI found no evidence of criminality, the special court then ordered re-investigation and the CBI, again, did not find evidence against Gupta. Subsequently, the court charged him and other civil servants with criminal conspiracy, misconduct and corruption. The CBI has then raised issues related to non-adherence with guidelines in other cases. The Supreme Court has held that guidelines are not binding and are not law, therefore, whether ...

Public policy plays a critical part in determining the development outcomes in most countries.Public Policy has come of age. From being a small part of the curriculum of Public Administration courses or even of the parent discipline of Political Science there is a worldwide recognition today that public policy plays a critical part in determining the development outcomes in most countries. A study of public policy per se has therefore assumed great significance now. The increasing interaction between sub-national entities and supra-national entities sometimes bypassing the national governments has all added new dimensions to the concept and the process of Public policy. PG programme Realising the importance of public policy as an academic programme and the tremendous employment opportunities the field has opened up, the ICFAI School of Public Policy (ISPP) has started a postgraduate programme in Public Policy (Masters in Public Policy).The school is headed by Prof. B.V Rama Rao,...