Nick Manning

International Public Administration Reform : Implications for the Russian Federation

This paper was produced by the World Bank Russia public administration reform team in response to a request from the Russian Federation Government. It has benefited from discussions in a series of initial seminars held in December 2000 in Moscow and from subsequent detailed discussions in Moscow over the period January 2001 to June 2002 with officials and experts engaged on preparing the Russian Federations Civil Service Reform Program. Experts from the Russian State Service Academy, the Higher School of Economics, Moscow State University, the Institute of State and Law of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Experts for Labor Foundation, the Institute for Economies in Transition, the State University of Management and the Siberian State Service Academy participated in the seminars and subsequent discussions, as did officials from the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, the Ministry for Labor and Social Development, and representatives from the Administration of the President.

Reforming Fiscal and Economic Management in Afghanistan

The paper cover two broad themes in the recent reform of fiscal and economic management in Afghanistan. The first part, The Journey So Far, sets out the impressive policy and institutional reforms that the Interim and Transitional Administrations have made since the Bonn conference in November 2001. It provides some details of the challenges faced by the Ministry of Finance, and very particularly the complexities of managing intensive donor interest and significant volumes of development assistance, while balancing the need for responsiveness to donor priorities with a concern to build institutional strengths of the public sector. The section notes the complexity of the vested interests that had built up within the administration during the Soviet and Taliban periods, and the need to revive, while simultaneously reforming, the fiscal management processes. The second part, Current Priorities, explores the fiscal and economic management tasks that the Ministry of Finance is now confronted with. The section opens with a review of the strategic options for structuring the Ministry of Finance, and the additional challenges and opportunities presented by the new constitution. The revised budget law is perhaps the most significant and far-reaching of the institutional reforms planned. The significance of the municipalities as a potential platform for enhanced service delivery to an increasingly urbanized population is also noted.