A two-day international conference on the theme “Challenges of governance in South Asia” was held in the capital a few days ago. The conference which was jointly organised by the Department of Administration and Organization Theory, Bergen University, Norway, and Central Department of Public Administration, Tribhuvan University, Nepal was funded by a project “Governance matters: Assessing, Diagnosing and Addressing Challenges of Governance in Nepal”, currently underway with the financial assistance of Bergen University. This project has conducted two baseline surveys regarding citizens’ trust in public institutions in Nepal and the efficacy of citizen charter currently practiced in municipalities across the country.

During the conference, nine sessions were held in which over thirty papers were presented. Prof. Perr Laegreid from Bergen University in his keynote speech on “New Public Management (NPM): Towards a Whole-of Government or a Neo-Weberian Model” raised some basic questions on governance practices. He was against the replacement of NPM but devised some additions to neo-Weberian modality. He stressed the importance of strengthening the centre, coordination in and between sectors, proactive leadership, cooperation among organisations, and importance of value based management and governance through networks.

Prof Perr Laegreid openly advocated a strong and modernised state and bringing back the bureaucracy to the forefront. If classical Weberian principles are combined with result orientation, citizen orientation and professionalisation of public services, most of the present problems of governance can be addressed properly.

In her paper on “Innovating public service delivery systems for ordinary people”, Professor Amita Singh from the Jawaharlal Nehru University, India emphasised the very role of the state. Citing the success stories of Godhara and Bundelkhand, she emphasised that civil society or private organisations can be of great help but the lead should be taken by the state structures. State functionaries should be revitalised instead of being replaced.

Prof Salahuddin from Dhaka University, Bangl-adesh while analysing the issues and challenges

of local capacity building in the context of Bangladesh emphasised the importance of capacity building of local government institutions before decentralising them. He aptly remarked that efficiently run centralisation brings better results than poorly managed decentralisation. While searching for professionalism the larger interests of the citizens sho-uld not be ignored. In reality, citizens are the means as well as ends of governance. So, citizens should always be put at the forefront. Even in the face of all odds, governance must be effective and citizen-centric.

For this, the Weberian model must be revisited and state’s role be revitalised. Good governance is the outcome of the government functioning as a whole of its constituents. Citizens cannot be empowered without empowering the government. Success stories can be replicated but that might not serve our best interests. We should also collect and analyse the failure stories, so as to be able to deal with exigencies.

Pokharel is professor at Central Department of PA, TU