Administrative Reform in Bangladesh: An Unfinished Agenda

During the 1990s, several developing countries embarked on the business of reforming their public administrative systems. In very few instances, the incentive for change was generated from within; this is, it was driven by high levels of political commitment or buoyant bureaucratic support. In most instances blase political executives and conservative bureaucracies needed external stimulation to engage in planned exercises to transform their administrative systems into productive tools of nation-building and development. In the former case, political executives receptive to the positive impact of governmental reform in advanced industrialized societies and other developing nations showed enthusiasm in accepting and adapting new administrative forms and techniques in state management. In the latter, the push came mainly from international organizations -- the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the British Overseas Development Administration (ODA), and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) -- which made development aid and cooperation to these countries conditional upon the implementation of political, economic, and administrative reforms according to the standards of "good governance" advanced by them in the late 1980s and after.