Deregulating the Public Service: Can Government be Improved?

by John J. DiIulio Jr.

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The nation's federal, state, and local public service is in deep trouble. Not even the most talented, dedicated, well-compensated, well-trained, and well-led public servants can serve the public well if they must operate under perverse personnel and procurement regulations that punish innovation and promote inefficiency. Many attempts have been made to determine administrative problems in the public service and come up with viable solutions. Two of the most important—the 1990 report of the National Commission on the Public Service, led by former Federal Reserve chairman Paul A. Volcker, and the 1993 report of the National Commission on the State and Local Public Service, led by former Mississippi Governor William F. Winter—recommended ""deregulating the public service."" Deregulating the public service essentially means altering or abolishing personnel and procurement regulations that deplete government workers' creativity, reduce their productivity, and make a career in public service unattractive to many talented, energetic, and public-spirited citizens. But will it work? With the benefit of a historical perspective on the development of American public service from the days of the progressives to the present, the contributors to this book argue that deregulating the public service is a necessary but insufficient condition for much of the needed improvement in governmental administration. Avoiding simple solutions and quick fixes for long-standing ills, they recommend new and large-scale experiments with deregulating the public service at all levels of government. In addition to editor John DiIulio, the contributors are Paul A. Volcker, former chairman of the Federal Reserve, now at Princeton University; former Mississippi Governor William F. Winter; Gerald J. Garvey, Princeton; John P. Burke, University of Vermont; Melvin J. Dubnick, Rutgers; Constance Horner, former director of the Federal Office of Personnel Management, now at Brookings; Mark Alan Hughes, Harvard; Steven Kelman, Harvard; Donald F. Kettl, University of Wisconsin at Madison; Mark H. Moore, Harvard; Richard P. Nathan, State University of New York at Albany; Neal R. Peirce, The National Review; and James Q. Wilson, UCLA.
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Genres: Nonfiction

Paperback

First published November 1, 1987

About the author

John J. DiIulio, Jr. is the Freeric Fox Leadership Professor and Professor of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania, and has won each of Penn's most prestigious teaching awards. He was previously Professor of Politics and Public Affairs at Princeton University. He received his Ph. D. in Political Science from Harvard University. He has been a senior fellow and directed research programs at several leading think tanks including the Brookings Institution, and has won awards from the Association of Public Policy Analysis and Management, the American Political Science Association, and other bodies. He has advised presidential candidates in both parties, served on bipartisan government reform commissions, and worked as a senior staff member in the White House.

Reviews

[Daemonsw0lf]

If you are a criminal justice professional or working in the field of corrections, this is a reference worth having and is absolutely worth reading. DiIulio's presentations on prisons is an anecdotal, narrative, and technical masterpiece for its particular topic. There are not many books on prisons that are so easy to read. His prose is simple, comprehensible and effective.

DiIulio presents the definitions of three prison models: the Control model, such as the one used in the state of Texas; the Responsibility model such as the one used in Michigan; and the California model, which is a combination of the previous two. His comparative study of all three systems utilizes anecdotes and first person perspectives of the environment and its operational effectiveness as well as empirical data gleaned primarily by personal research and technical study. DiIluio successfully presents the pros, cons and overall argument for the management in all three of these models.

His presentation is unbiased as humanly possible. As stated before he presents both the positives and negative of all of the models and compares them to each other. His study does not particularly support or deny any particular model. However, this book presents the opportunity to significantly advance our understanding as to how prisons work and are managed. DiIulio has given grounds to successfully reopen the debate of prison operations and management.

[John]

This is a wonderful historical perspective of the 3 largest prisons in the US. It also gives hints and suggestions to the future.