First of all, the new public service theory is the sublation of the new public management theory.
1, the defects of the new public management theory. The emergence of new public management theory has injected fresh blood into government reform. The core idea of new public management is the bounded rationality of the government and the assumption of "economic man" of government officials. The government is similar to the enterprise organization under the condition of market economy, and the relationship between the government and the people is the relationship between the producers and consumers of public services. Therefore, its core content is to apply the methods of private sector and industrial and commercial enterprises to the public sector, emphasizing market competition, performance evaluation of government work, transparent orientation of administrative process, cost efficiency and customer orientation. For a time, "enterprise government", "marketization", "slimming government" and "reshaping government" have become popular words with high usage rate of government officials. However, the concept of new public management does not cover the basic concepts that the government should cover in today's practice. Moreover, the new public management overemphasizes the role of the market mechanism, the government learns from enterprises and enterprises provide goods to improve public services, which often leads to the difference between the public sector and the private sector in practice, resulting in ethical and responsibility problems. In addition, there are some unsatisfactory corruption phenomena in the process of marketization. All these have led to the prominence of fairness and justice.
An important viewpoint of the new public management is that the government no longer takes the helm and paddles at the same time, but leaves the task of paddling to a more efficient market, and the government concentrates on taking the helm. Mr. and Mrs. Denhardt raised a substantive question: "When we are eager to steer, have we forgotten who the owner of this ship is?" From the perspective of controlling and controlling society, the government has done a lot in the past and has indeed played a positive role. But for modern society, is this unipolar control structure still reasonable? Modern society is a diversified structure in more sense, even in the field of public administration, it should also reflect the subjectivity of citizens. In fact, the citizen is a multi-role. They are not only the main providers of public finance, but also the recipients of public services. They are also participants in all kinds of life and supervisors of the realization of public interests. In the final analysis, as the ultimate authorizers, they can even authorize non-governmental organizations in the form of new contracts, instead of just pointing to the government, which challenges the helmsman's position. In this sense, in many cases, the role of the government in the future will no longer be dominant, but only a very important participant. For paddlers, not only the single structure of the market can be fully provided, but also more diverse participation forces are needed to reconstruct the system.
2. The new public service theory is the sublation of the new public management theory. On the basis of criticizing and rethinking the new public management, some scholars put forward new theories of new public service. Mr. and Mrs. Danhart provided a representative paradigm to compare the new public service with the new public management, and they put forward seven aspects that are of considerable guiding significance to service administration: 1. Service rather than turning; 2. Public interest is a goal rather than a by-product; 3. Think strategically and act democratically; 4. Serve the public instead of customers; 5. The responsibility is not single; 6. Pay attention to people rather than productivity; 7. Beyond entrepreneurship, pay attention to civil rights and public services. Mr. Xia commented on this: "It is no accident that the new public service movement appeared after traditional public management and new public management. Therefore, no matter how different and controversial the theoretical viewpoints and specific contents are, one thing seems to be affirmative and can not be ignored, that is, to emphasize or remind public management that it is mainly or ultimately the nature of public services. "
Different from the economic concept that the new public management is based on the maximization of personal interests, the new public service is based on the concept of public interests and the fact that public managers serve citizens wholeheartedly. The transcendence of new public service over new public service management is mainly reflected in: (1) New public service calls for safeguarding public interests. "When citizens can act according to public interests, the broad interests of society can be separated from an independent and isolated existence and transformed into a virtue and complete existence, making contributions to society. (2) New public services emphasize respect for civil rights. Advocates of new public services insist that the relationship between government and citizens is different from that between enterprises and customers. " Citizens have a sense of public affairs, a sense of belonging, a concern for the whole, and a social and moral contract for their own destiny. "Advocates of new public services believe that if public organizations can operate through cooperation and sharing on the basis of respecting citizens, they will succeed. (3) New public services reposition the role of the government. The new public service believes that one of the most important changes in today's political life is the change of decision-making. The government is no longer in a controlling position, but only a very important participant. More interest groups directly participate in the formulation and implementation of policies. The new public service holds that administrators should realize that public projects and public resources do not belong to them. As responsible participants, rather than entrepreneurs, they are "managers of public resources, promoters of civil rights and democratic dialogue, catalysts for community participation and street leaders" and will increasingly play the role of mediation, coordination and even adjudication.
3. The new public service theory needs development and practice. What the new public management strives to achieve is to cure a series of public management dilemmas. The practical problems make it necessary to pay attention to the instrumental rationality of efficiency. Correspondingly, it has little interest in what kind of ultimate value it pursues and lacks the understanding of the urgency of discussion. As a perspective of reform and treatment, we have given a lot of recognition and affirmation to the concept and scheme of new public management, but such theoretical progress is more based on the level of technology and tools, which is what we call formal preference. However, the new public service attempts to gradually shift the management perspective to pay attention to the basic value of management and even social development. Based on the past and reality, we need to find a new balance between these two concepts in the process of reform.
Although the Danhart couple found that there seems to be too much difference between the two projects, from the perspective of dynamic development, form and value must actually have a suitable texture. Just as we think that even in the period of "absence of subject" in public management, we are taking the long road of returning to basic values. Just because the concept at that time was so simple, we can't deny that this is a historical process of coupling form and value. On the one hand, the new public service is really attractive, on the other hand, there are many puzzles, which can't keep up with the new public management in practice.
Second, the confusion of the new public service theory
The transformation from public administration to advocating service value and substantive justice requires efforts to establish an administrative system based on citizens and pursuing public interests. How will the first question of this theoretical hypothesis be defined as "whether it is possible" or "whether it is operable"? In fact, through analysis, I found that there are four puzzles that must be solved to answer their reality.
First, why are citizens rational? Citizen-oriented means that public administration must meet the needs of citizens and provide service upgrades for the ever-developing needs. Then, it is very necessary for citizens' rationality, which includes three levels of significance:
1. Do citizens know their needs accurately? In fact, citizens often pay the most attention to basic needs, but lack understanding of possible or high-level needs, which is mainly caused by the differences in demand environment, demand stage and demand crowd. For example, people living in cities yearn for rural pastoral environment, while rural residents will feel that modern urban life is better. The "besieged city" dilemma of this demand does not mean absolute demand, but staged comparison and compensation psychology. Therefore, the needs of citizens are always inadequately expressed or time-varying, and it seems impossible to seek a clear understanding at present.
2. Can citizens fully express their needs? Even if citizens are fully aware of their own needs, can they clearly convey these needs to suppliers? The answer isno. The expression of citizens depends on three factors: a. The expression ability of citizens varies from person to person. It is doubtful whether the most expressive people can express themselves most clearly, not to mention the diverse groups of citizens. B. expression of citizens' will. Citizens' willingness to express is greatly influenced by individual emotions. People with different psychological qualities and personalities have different views on expression. C. The cost of expression is actually very important. If citizens think that the cost of dialogue is higher than the income or worry that their investment will sink, they will give up many opportunities for expression.
3. Do citizens think their needs have been met? The evaluation system of citizens also reflects the difference. Even the same homogeneous service is different for different objects. This dilemma often appears, which makes service providers at a loss and often affects fairness and institutionalization.
Therefore, in reality, different citizens have different levels of individual rationality, and the overall investigation is more uncertain, which can only be called a collection of limited rationality.
Secondly, why is the Government satisfactory? As a service provider, how to satisfy the public is a big problem. As the subject of power and rights, citizens should not be grateful or tolerant to the government when receiving services. They should usually think about the following questions:
1. Does the government consider us wholeheartedly? Government officials are ordinary citizens with dual identities. On the one hand, they have the needs of citizens, on the other hand, they have to realize government services through their own jobs. Will the collection of this special group bring about the individualization of the government and the collectivization of interests? When considering basic service points, can they remain fair? Is it possible to maintain value neutrality in conflict areas? The above concerns are not unfounded. The previous "economic man" hypothesis actually added more uncertainty in this respect.
2. Can the government provide as many good services as possible? This problem is directly related to the government's willingness and ability to serve: from the perspective of willingness, after being fully authorized, the government must have practical actions to honor the contract and innovative spirit to improve the service, and must also ensure that it can be implemented in institutionalized design rather than dispensable random arrangements; From the perspective of ability, the government should show enough quality to control its responsibilities in specific administration, and have convincing practice to conduct regular verification; In essence, this issue is also closely related to the government's recognition of citizens' needs. To what extent all the needs expressed by citizens have been answered, and whether it has brought promises and expectations for future service upgrading is beyond the grasp of the existing loose civil society structure.
3. Is the government trustworthy and irreplaceable? Since service is the fundamental orientation of citizens to the government, are all the functions played by the government irreplaceable? Do we have reason to believe that this is the best possibility to provide some public goods? In fact, a pluralistic society and structure provide the possibility of other choices. If the government can't prove that it still needs to take the lead, it must give up the authorization contract it obtained in the past and take the initiative to quit, but this kind of conscious action of the government often lacks pressure and motivation.
Therefore, the government is always unsatisfactory, and reform has even become a regular task.
Third, how can the government and citizens achieve the same core values? As the pursuit of ideas, "productivity" and "efficiency", "democracy" and "justice", "security" and "welfare" have different understandings and preferences in social cognition, so it is usually impossible for citizens to reach a consensus, and the government will have different interpretations at various stages. The question also lies in the extent to which the government, as an authorized service subject, can exert influence on the unification of social values, and how capable it is to integrate all parties for unified action and ensure that it does not infringe on civil rights. On the other hand, why do citizens, as the subject of power, agree with certain values, and how can they maintain the integration and balance conflict between individual and group diversified values? We will find that the value dispute actually boils down to the fundamental basis of the relationship between citizens and the government-legitimacy recognition. The reform of public service administration should not be a movement that stays at the level of technical repair, but should be an all-round reconstruction and transcendence with epoch-making significance.
Fourth, is public service now or in the future? Based on the above analysis, we find that there is still a big gap between the facts and the value orientation of building service administration, especially in the face of past abuses and crises, the need for formal correction is more urgent, and the deliberate pursuit of ideas is out of date.
Then, is the service theory too advanced or partially beyond our times and should be regarded as the ideal of the future? Answering this question is urgent for the constructiveness of the current guiding theory and unavoidable for the management and service of the new public.
Three. conclusion
The confusion of public service presumption does not deny the possibility of public service theory, but puts forward the basic content of theoretical construction that public service must solve. The establishment of public service theory must pay attention to the above problems. If any theory can't solve the above confusion, I'm afraid it will still "confuse the specification and description" and it is difficult to provide a "convincing alternative". The form of government in history has played at least two roles in social development. One is the omnipotent intervener, which we have seen in most historical periods, and the other is the role of "night watchman" or weak government strongly demanded by marketization and liberals. In fact, do citizens who are the noumenon of power really need to make an either-or choice? Of course not, the new public service theory actually calls for a new sense of government remodeling project. First of all, we need a government that looks up to us. They must record the power we can give, the power we firmly reserve and the administrative power we prohibit from exercising, and determine the law to protect them. Second, we need a government that is enthusiastic about our needs. They should divide different demand levels that must be provided, provided as much as possible and better provided by third parties, and then strive to achieve such supply; In the end, we need a government that serves us wholeheartedly. Their mission is to respect human personality, affirm human value and promote human development. What do you serve for? It boils down to one sentence: "Democratic government exists to serve the public interest." What we need is a new service-oriented government.