CHAPTER 12 : ACCOUNTABILITY AND ETHICS Study Question : 1.

Can you identify a case of public administration with which you are familiar where the official violated his or her public trust, in your view? If so, what seems to have been the cause? How was the breach of trust discovered, and how was the issue resolved? Do you believe the resolution was the best one possible? 2. How realistic do you think the notion of an inner check on administrators conduct? Answer : In Public administration world we can find a lot of mistakes of public administrators such as public sector or government. There are complicated organization, how the civil servants provide regulation for community, how they worked and who will monitoring and control them when they worked and develop service planning for public. When we read the newspaper, television or searching on internet we can found several problems was established by government staff. In addition, effect of that as public service organization they were unable to maintain public trust. The biggest problem was happened are what is regulation standard implemented to them, so they do not stray and violated from their job. Based on rosenbloom book,Why do public administrators violate their public trust sometimes? He describes three main reasons are identified : (1) misconceptions of the public interest; (2) corruption; and (3) subversion.1 This is three circle of public administrator or civil servants problems with public in Rosenbloom review. for example, what is the failure of public administrator and the famous case are corruption, corruption has been blamed for the failures of certain developing countries to develop, and recent empirical research confirms a link between higher perceived corruption and lower investment and growth2. This case very familiar for people around the world, because this is disease for each government, society and organization in public sector even private sector. At the same time, the main reason is corruption killing and corruption robs peoples' rights. In addition, effect of that as public service organization they were unable to maintain public trust.

David H. Rosenbloom, Robert S. Kravchuk, & Richard M. Clerkin. (2009). Public administration: Understanding management, politics and law in the public sector. (7th ed.). Boston, MA: McGrawHill. P 556-557 2 Mauro, P., (1995). Corruption and growth. Quarterly Journal of Economics 110 (3), 681712. Public Management, Accountability and Ethics |1

For example, this is one of corruption scandal in Malaysia, the "cows-for-condos", a scandal linking Women, Family and Community Development Minister Shahrizat Abdul Jalil and her family to the alleged misappropriation of millions of dollars in government loans. After that a Malaysian minister announced her resignation Sunday amid an alleged corruption scandal that has put pressure on Prime Minister Najib Razak's government ahead of looming elections3 (news.malaysia.msn.com:11 March 2012). Related to the article above, Perceived corruption and economic mismanagement were among voters' key grouses in the last general election, when the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition suffered its worst results ever (bikyamasr.com:11 March 2012), the effect of this scandal, the politician will face lost their voters for next election, people will make untrusted motion for them. A part of that, as Rosenbloom said, Corruption can be definied as a betrayal of public trust for reasons private interest4. What causes incidents like the above have been happen?, Basically that is because accountability and ethic moral within another perspective of weakness of monitoring and control of public administrator by the government. Likely Rosenbloom said, A close relationship with a particular clientele group or constituency is another factor that can lead public administrators to misconstrue the public interest5 The perspectives have views on accountability and ethics. In my opinion based on Rosenbloom how to fixed and maintaining the problems with the government staff and minimalization of mistakes is The traditional managerial, this is one of perspective view6, for example, stresses the need for organizational unity to assure efficiency, economy and effectiveness. Translated this means authority and responsibility must be clearly assigned; strict subordination should exist to supervisors who have a limited span of control allowing them to control their subordinates; subordinates are encouraged to be loyal to the organization and their bosses; when a breakdown occurs, strict discipline is used; and where fiscal issues are at stake, internal audits or checks are emphasized. This is one way how to find out the problem with the civil servants accountability and ethic, and make emphasize minimalization of failure. In my view monitoring and control also another way to reduce
3

Agence France-Presse, http://news.malaysia.msn.com/regional/article.aspx?cp-documentid=5981968 11 March 2012

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Rosenbloom, D. H., Kravchuk, R.S. & Clerkin, R. M. (2009). Public administration: Understanding management, politics and law in the public sector. (7th ed.). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. P 561 5 Ibid.,. P. 557 6 Ibid.,. P. 569-570 Public Management, Accountability and Ethics |2

fraud. Even though, we can choose any solution with different problem because different situation will have been difference solution. In the same way, how to know inner check on administrators bevahiour probably is professionalism including the ethic codes and self-control, but that is not perfect fully perception because other bad influence can make another bad way to makes mistake and blame the professionalism. In my opion according to Rosenbloom, we combine the new public management and political approach7. the NPM tends to assume that most people are good and that focusing on corruption is not cost-effective. It wants to establish an environment of trust and the political perspective wants mechanisms to establish accountability that are external to the individual. Finnally, how to check and make good rule of the public administators based on accountability and ethics is develop the professionalism environment and also pressed of failure and fraud. Meanwhile, public administrators hopefully do not make violates to public because they have the ethic codes and vows as civil servants. REFERENCES : Mauro, P., (1995). Corruption and growth. Quarterly Journal of Economics 110 (3), 681712 Rosenbloom, D. H., Kravchuk, R.S. & Clerkin, R. M. (2009). Public administration: Understanding management, politics and law in the public sector. (7th ed.). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill.

INTERNET SOURCES: http://news.malaysia.msn.com/regional/article.aspx?cp-documentid=5981968 11 March 2012 http://bikyamasr.com/61498/malaysian-senior-minister-resigns-amid-corruption-scandal/ 11 march 2012

Ibid., P. 560
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Public Management, Accountability and Ethics