CAPAM Symposium: Rising to the challenge: enhancing public sector capability
| DOI | 10.1177/0020852307083454 |
| Published date | 01 December 2007 |
| Date | 01 December 2007 |
| Author | Christopher Pollitt |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
CAPAM Symposium: Rising to the challenge: enhancing public
sector capability
Editor’s introduction
Christopher Pollitt
One of the privileges of becoming Editor of IRAS was that I was enabled to attend
my first CAPAM Conference, in Sydney, from 21 to 25 October 2006. I must admit
that, as an Englishman of a certain age, I had had my suspicions of the Common-
wealth Association for Public Administration and Management (CAPAM). Would it
turn out to be a dusty gathering of elderly civil servants, nostalgically longing for a
golden age of imperial order, at which I would feel an awkward, unelected repre-
sentative of the ‘mother country’? Well, I am happy to report that it turned out to be
something completely different – and far, far more interesting. The Sydney confer-
ence was attended by more than 400 people from 48 countries. The majority were
senior civil servants, but there was also a smattering of academics. The atmosphere
was lively and convivial. No deference whatsoever (thank goodness) was paid to the
UK, and I did not see a single member of the dusty-haired civil service gerontocracy.
What I did see was a vibrant and diverse community, equally interested in the
problems they shared and what made them different from each other. And, above
all, I detected a real passion for improving public services – one that had little to do
with contemporary political correctness and everything to do with professionalism
and commitment to the abiding, long-term values of the public service ethic.
Choosing a selection of papers to publish from a much larger number presented
at a conference is always a difficult business. This is doubly true of a conference like
CAPAM’s. Many of the presentations are by practitioners and are highly effective for
their immediate purpose, but not entirely suitable for publication in a scientific journal
(just as many respectable scientific articles would make rather feeble presentations to
practitioners). With extensive assistance from CAPAM, we narrowed the multitude
down to ten, and finally down to the five articles which follow this introduction. I
Christopher Pollitt is Editor of the International Review of Administrative Sciences and Research
Professor, Public Management Institute, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium.
Copyright © 2007 IIAS, SAGE Publications (Los Angeles, London, New Delhi and Singapore)
Vol 73(4):515–516 [DOI:10.1177/0020852307083454]
International
Review of
Administrative
Sciences
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