Greek Reporter — The Greek civil service’s ineffectiveness often brings misery and frustration to millions of Greeks.
Now, it has been properly assessed and ranked along other developed countries by a survey from the University of Oxford. The results confirm the dismal state of the Greek civil service.
The civil service index was created to help government leaders understand how their public servants are performing compared to those in other countries. This matters, the researchers argued, because civil servants play such a vital role in a country’s development.
The index will be published annually during the next four years; researchers are hoping to add more countries to the list while broadening the scope of their assessment tool.
At present, Greece was ranked third from bottom in the first-ever attempt to compare bureaucracies worldwide. The International Civil Service Effectiveness Index (InCiSE), draws together a wealth of existing data to provide a concise assessment.
Indicators that make up the index include: the degree and quality of consultation with wider society, the effectiveness of regulation, the effectiveness of tax administration, the effectiveness of fiscal and financial management, crisis and risk management, human resources, digital services, integrity, capability and inclusiveness, the quality of policy advice theme, data availability and accessibility and data impact, user focused services, corruption perceptions, work ethics, fairness and impartiality, and capability.
The InCiSE Index covers 31 countries across Europe, North America, South America, Asia and Australasia.
By assessing civil service effectiveness based on how the civil service delivers its functions, the Index reveals what countries do well and where they can improve.
Canada is ranked top overall of this inaugural Index, followed by New Zealand and Australia respectively. When scores are adjusted for GDP per capita (to take account of countries’ relative wealth and thus the potential resources available for civil service operations) then Estonia is ranked top overall, followed by Mexico and New Zealand respectively.
The InCiSE Index is a collaboration between the Blavatnik School of Government at the University of Oxford and the Institute for Government. The project has been supported by the UK Civil Service and is funded by the Open Society Foundations.
