Public Service Characteristics

Analyzing the politics of public services: a service characteristics approach

In their academic article “Analyzing the politics of public services: a service characteristics approach,” Richard Bratley and Daniel Harris provide a tool to explain political dynamics of specific services. They argue that their framework to analyze political dynamics has been tested and can be used on current issues across fields such as education, sanitation, water and health. According to the authors, their analytical framework can successfully be used as a tool for “understanding why services and tasks within them differ in the types of political dynamics they tend to attract.” They support this claim by describing how service characteristics affect the politics

The authors argue that if providers do not have a high degree of professional dominance then policy makers and managers are more able to monitor and control them. They further argue that policy makers and managers will be more able control and monitor providers where procedures and outputs of delivery are easily measureable and standardized. However, things get complicated when service provider knowledge promotes capacity to organize and control their own interest, as in the case of doctors and teachers. It is very unlikely that politicians will agitate for service improvements where front-line providers are also politically organized and politicians depend upon their

Their work is significant because their service characteristic approach can be used as a framework to explain the basic political dynamics of particular services. However, I find it mundane that it leaves out a huge issue that shadows political dynamics of providing or improving services in developing countries, which is corruption. Bratley and Harris, very naively, argue that politicians only look for electoral/clientelistic returns and political attribution. While this might be true in a few developing countries, it is not true for most developing countries. In developing countries most politicians look for personal economical benefit whenever thinking about what service to improve or provide. Most politicians use their influence, in exchange of money, when it is time to decide about who gets contracts to provide or improve services. More often than not, these services are poorly delivered or not delivered at all. This is a huge issue, which is part of political dynamics of providing or improving