PRELIMINARY ANNOUNCEMENT

The NISPAcee Steering Committee has selected two themes
dealing with different aspects of the relations between the Administration and the Public:

A. WORKING SESSIONS:
RELATIONS BETWEEN THE ADMINISTRATION AND THE PUBLIC

Dear Participant,
In preparation for the forthcoming NISPAcee conference on 'Improving Relations between the Administration and the Public' here is some supplementary information on how the Working Sessions will be conducted and the objectives which we would like to achieve.
Working sessions: will not be run as a 'formal' academic conference as the aim is to stimulate debate and discussion. Each session will be opened by a short presentation by the co-ordinator (5-10 min) outlining the main issues and raising questions for discussion. In the course of the debate, participants indicated on the programme as having papers relevant to specific session topics, will be asked to present relevant material drawn from their papers, as well as their own experience, if pertinent. The presentations and discussions are expected to highlight: the main problems and challenges of improving citizen-administration interactions; short and long-term perspectives for future development; main debates, failures and successes in administrative reforms to achieve this objective. The role of the co-ordinators will be to draw out the main issues raised in a given session and present them to the group for inclusion in our report to the plenary session on Saturday morning.
The establishment of a Working Group on Improving Citizen-Administration relations: one of the issues for consideration by the two working sessions ('Improving accessibility and participation' and 'Organisational arrangements to serve clients') is the establishment of a single Working Group which would co-ordinate policy-relevant research on 'Improving citizen-administration relations'. The results of such research would then be presented and discussed within the Working Group, on the occasion of the annual NISPAcee conference. This objective will be discussed during the last of this year's working sessions and the level of interest in this proposal evaluated.
We look forward to meeting you in Sofia in a few weeks time for what promises to be a very interesting conference.
Yours sincerely,
Joanne Caddy (SIGMA-OECD)
Emilia Kandeva (New Bulgarian University)
Jeffrey Straussman (Syracuse University) and
Mirko Vintar (University of Ljubljana)

I. WORKING SESSION:IMPROVING ACCESSIBILITY AND PARTICIPATION
Contact persons:
Joanne Caddy, SIGMA/OECD, Paris, France
E-mail: joan.caddy@oecd.org
Emilia Spiridonova-Kandeva, New Bulgarian University, Sofia, Bulgaria
HOW MIGHT ONE INCREASE CITIZENS' ACCESS TO THEIR ADMINISTRATION? MANY APPROACHES EXIST, FROM THE DESIGN OF BUILDINGS AND OFFICES, TO USING ALTERNATIVE DELIVERY MECHANISMS. THE PUBLIC ALSO NEEDS TO BE CONSULTED SO THAT THOSE CITIZENS' NEEDS INFLUENCE THEIR GOVERNMENT'S OUTCOMES. SOME OF THE MECHANISMS THAT ARE AVAILABLE ARE SURVEYS, TOWN HALL MEETINGS, PUBLIC HEARINGS AND MEETINGS WITH INTEREST GROUPS.

List of Papers:

BULGARIA

SPIRIDONOVA-KANDEVA Emilia, New Bulgarian University
Redesigning the relationship between the administration and citizens: An important task of administrative reform in Bulgaria

RADOVANOVA Petja, Samardjieva Marija
Some aspects in relationship between local administration and civil society organizations in transition period

ESTONIA

LAINURM Kaido-Allan
Participatory democracy - the role of NGOs in developing process of local authorities

Georg Sootla
Client orientation as a strategy for the promoting effective public organizations

KYRGYZSTAN

MURZAEV Salih
Information relations between administration and public in Kyrgyzstan; Improvement of accessibility and participation

LATVIA

KALNISH Armans
Relations between the administration and public

LITHUANIA

VAICIUNIENE Jolanta
Strengthening relations between local government and the public: case studies in Lithuania

ROMANIA

PAMFIL Claudia
Changing attitudes between partners: a challenge for citizens and local government - a Romanian case study

USA

BAAR Kenneth
Public services through "private" contracts: Transparency issues<

ROSENBAUM Allan
Good governance, accountability and the public servant

II. WORKING SESSION: REDUCING THE ADMINISTRATIVE BURDEN; PRACTISE AND TOOLS
Contact persons:
Jeffrey Straussman, Syracuse University, New York, USA,
E-mail: jstrauss@maxwell.syr.edu
Mirko Vintar, School of Public Administration, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia
AS BUREAUCRATS ENFORCE NEW AND DIFFERENT POLICIES, THE INTERFACE BETWEEN THEM AND THE USERS WILL BE DIFFERENT THAN WHAT IT USED TO BE. THE VALUES WHICH BUREAUCRATS MUST FOLLOW SUCH AS TRANSPARENCY AND REGULARITY WILL BE FACED WITH USERS' IMPERATIVES SUCH AS SPEED, EFFICIENCY, SIMPLICITY, AND LOW COST. ONE CAN PREDICT INCREASED ADMINISTRATIVE PROBLEMS. TECHNIQUES TO REDUCE SUCH BURDENS CAN TAKE MANY FORMS, SUCH AS SIMPLIFICATION AND STANDARDISATION OF FORMS, REDUCTION IN THE NUMBER OF REQUIREMENTS AND THE USE OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY. FOR EXAMPLE, SIMPLIFYING THE NUMBER OF FORMS REQUIRED TO OBTAIN A LICENSE TO START A BUSINESS, OR FOR COLLECTING PERSONAL TAXES ARE TWO SUCH AREAS. AN ADDED ADVANTAGE OF SIMPLIFICATION IS THAT IT MAY REDUCE OPPORTUNITIES FOR CORRUPTION.