Public service reform

The Economist talks about public service reform:

But voters, and thus politicians, are especially intolerant of civil-service inefficiency nowadays. One prompt is austerity. Another is technology, which is changing not only how public services are delivered—think of “massively open online courses” in education—but also the way they can be measured. Social networks enable users to grumble about hospital waiting-times and mathematics results. Perhaps the biggest pressure is the passing of time: private-sector workers are incredulous as to why civil servants should escape the creative destruction that has changed other offices around the world. Mandarin Lessons, 'the Economist', 9 August 2014

Quite. Why is it that the achievement of social goals remains (largely) a government monopoly? No good reason, other than vested interests and highly successful patch protection.

The Economist goes on to talk about pay and the need for long-term, strategic thinking. Politicians love to restructure and re-prioritize, to tinker with funding, and to appoint placemen in powerful positions. The remedies the journal suggests include better pay, reduced security for top public service positions and, perhaps, appointing some overlord who takes an exceptionally long-term view.

I have another suggestion: target broad, meaningful outcomes, and let a motivated market decide on organizational structures, composition and the projects they undertake. Under a Social Policy Bond regime there might or might not be 'destruction' of such organizations, as envisaged by the Economist and as occurs in a well-functioning private sector, but such destruction is a means not an end. Social Policy Bonds would ensure that any such destruction would occur only if it were truly 'creative' in the sense of better achieving society's goals, as defined in the redemption terms of the Bonds.

It's likely that a new type of organization would result: one subordinated to the efficient achievement of meaningful social and environmental outcomes rather than, as now, the caprice of powerful interests, be they government or private sector.