"Whole of Government"

There is a fact that every major challenge of public administration---ensuring security, building a strong economy, coping with demographic change and crafting social policy---necessarily requires active participation of a range or central and line agencies. Dr. Peter Shergold AM from Australia said that the commitment to a whole of government perspective is not misinterpreted as a call for 'group think'. Governance has been improved by the fact that public policy is an increasingly contested terrain.

Australian Public Service has defined the 'whole of government' as: '"Public service agencies working across portfolio boundaries to achieve a shared goal and an integrated government response to particular issues. Approaches can be formal and informal. They can focus on policy development, program management, and service delivery." (Management Advisory Committee Australia, 2004)

As a response to NPM reforms, there is a new generation of reforms, initially labeled "joined-up government" and later known as "whole-of-government. This approach was implemented early in the Anglo-Saxon countries, such as the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. It was also employed in United States, under the heading of collaborative public management. Whole-of-Government term emerges from the increased fragmentation caused by NPM reform programs, United Kingdom, New Zealand, and Australia adopted coordination and integration strategy. (Christensen and Laegrid, 2007).

Therefore, whole of government is a new philosophy and spirit of public service delivery by working together as one entity. This new approach of government service is based on a thought that to the public, the government is one whole.

Scope of work of the Whole of Government are public service transformation, the customer perspective that sees the government as one entity, and the Zero-In-Process.

 I think the concept of Whole of Government is very good. It has a very great perspective of Public Administration paradigm, especially post-New Pubic Management paradigm. Since the New Public Service, there's no paradigm exist to be carried out. I think the Whole of Government is very similar to Collaborative Governance.

 

LESSON LEARNT

We should think ourself as a whole and collaborate inter government department, to achieve a single goal. It is very important, because a goal can only be achieved with the coordination and help from many specialties and sectors and it can't be finished alone.