Theme 2015: Integrity
in Public Governance
About the Working Group
The announced
2015 Working Group on Integrity in Public Governance is the continuation of the
WG which began 5 years ago. Topics on Ethics in Governance, Preventing
Corruption in Public Administration, and Integrity Management have received renewed
attention and new approaches can be observed. It is for this reason that we
decided to again put these topics on the WG list.
Background and justification
Administrative
malpractice, such as corruption, abuse of power, nepotism and favouritism, are
widespread in the public sector, including in the CEE countries. At the same
time, corruption and ethics have become important issues in the practice and
theory of politics, public administration, law, economics and society. This has
led to more awareness and knowledge. Practical solutions for ethical dilemmas
and successful professional solutions in administrative decision-making can be
formulated.
Although rules
and regulations are required to address such malpractice, ethical approaches
are also needed. Bottom-up initiatives must complement top-down activities.
The Working Group on Integrity in Public Governance brings together academics
and practitioners interested in the ethical dimension and professional work of
administrative decision-making.
The focus is to
measure the results and the impact of different activities and to analyse the
implementation of instruments. This includes questions concerning the principles
and standards of discretional power, neutrality and legality, transparency and
administrative responsiveness of the regime in office. It also includes the
questions of organisational optimisation and personnel development. The Working
Group on Integrity in Public Governance has an opportunity to exercise
leadership in the development and implementation of new directions in
administrative integrity and professionalism. Our Working group provides
answers to practitioners on how to optimise their organisation and how to train
and influence their personnel in order to obtain the best results and impact in
integrity management.
Call for papers
The membership
of the Working Group seeks to build connections between reflective
practitioners and engaged scholars in the Ethics/Integrity field, as a matter
of priority. The primary objective of the Group is to enrich the 2015
Conference programme with practice papers which focus on instruments, results
of implementations and impact. Presentations focused on any new aspect of the
field of Ethics/Integrity in Public Governance are welcome. Cross-disciplinary
studies are encouraged.
We are inviting all member institutions, associate and
individual members, as well as others interested in the topics of integrity in
public governance in Central and Eastern Europe to participate in and discuss
the following:
·Strategies:
What strategies and instruments are available to protect the integrity of
public administration and its public servants (public officials), in particular
CEE countries?
·Leadership:
What are the challenges of modern leadership in integrity management? What does
the profile of leaders look like? What kind of Leadership developments are in
place?
·Instruments:
What instruments to protect integrity in governance are working, in what
context and in what culture? What does not work and why?; promoting
transparency and accountability, conflicts of interests and incompatible
policy, recusal, whistleblowing, codes
of conduct, HRM practices - training, job rotation, and organisation
development etc.
·Institutions:
What institutions succeed in curbing corruption and other integrity violations?
What are the results of the various task forces? What is the impact of special
Integrity units in public administration and within an organisation?
·Organisation:
Which guidelines for organisations to improve integrity exist in practice and
with what result? What recommendations can be formulated for the development of
integrity guidelines in an organisation? How can guidelines be implemented
successfully?
·Training:
Which training activities for students, for professionals in the public service
and for politicians exist? What are the evaluations and impacts of the training
approaches? What are the contents of the trainings? Which are the target
groups?
·Law:
Which law and regulations are in place to combat corruption?
·Results
and impact: What are the results and the impact of the different laws and
instruments in place and the public awareness programmes?
The above mentioned fields of research and practice in
Integrity lead us to the following questions which are the focus of the Working
Group:
- Conflicts of Interest and Incompatibility,
- Integrity at the public sector/private sector
interface level (Public Procurement),
- Whistleblowing and promoting accountability,
- Corruption in the Public Sector,
- Building an effective "National Integrity
System”,
- Scrutiny of Governance by the Media and Civil
Society,
- Promoting integrity in public administration
through HRM practices,
- Organisational aspects of fighting corruption,
- Education and Training for Good Governance,
- Reaching EU and OECD standards in fighting
corruption,
- Implementation strategies,
- Law in combating corruption.
The working
group will collect the different existing research papers, practical reports
and presentations in the field of integrity. The Working Group members will
group the papers and bind them in a handbook entitled "Integrity in Public
Service”.
In our working
group, at least one session will be without presentations. We would like to
discuss the different approaches and decide the way forward and possible (funded)
projects in the field of integrity management.