Draft:New public service

New Public Service (NPS) is an approach that represents a shift in how public services are delivered and governed. It basically proposed that the citizens, community and civil society should be at the center of public management, and that the primary duty of public servants is to help citizens articulate and meet common public interests.

NPS advocates for the following ideologies:

1. Citizen-centric focus: NPS places citizens at the center, emphasizing their needs, preferences, and participation. Public servants view citizens as active partners rather than passive recipients of services.

2. Collaboration and co-production: NPS encourages collaboration among government agencies, nonprofits, and citizens. It recognizes that solving complex societal problems requires collective effort.

3. Democratic governance: NPS promotes transparency, accountability, and citizen engagement. It aims to strengthen democratic processes by involving citizens in decision-making.

4. Ethical leadership: NPS emphasizes ethical behavior, integrity, and public service values. Leaders prioritize the public interest over personal or organizational gain.

5. Social equity: NPS seeks to reduce disparities and ensure equitable access to services. It addresses social justice issues and promotes fairness.

The New Public Service can be characterized as a normative model in the field of Public Administration. It concentrates on providing a normative framework for guiding public administration and governance rather than being a theory while emphasizing constructs like public value, citizen-centricity, and collaboration. The emphasis is on what public administrators should aim for rather than precise definitions and measures. It provides guidance on agents of government on what should they do to effectively serve the public. It sets out a vision for ethical leadership, community engagement, collaboration, and other practices that should be followed in public administration. New Public Service prescribes an alternative approach to the classical public administration and new public management by advocating for a new set of values, principles, and practices that should be followed by those who are in public service

Principles
According to Denhardt and Denhardt (2000), the seven essential principles that are generated from New Public Service are as follows: serving citizens, not customers; meeting the public interest; prioritizing citizens over entrepreneurship; strategic thinking, acting democratically; recognizing the complexity of accountability; serving rather than directing; and prioritizing the interests of people, not just productivity.


 * 1) Serve people, not customers. The primary role of public service is to help community members express and realize agreed interests, rather than trying to control or steer the community in a new direction. In the new public service model, public services are based on democratic theory, which teaches the existence of equal rights and equality among citizens. Also, the kind of public services rendered to the people must be quality.
 * 2) Seek the public interest. The concept of public interest from the perspective of the New Public Service is formulated as a result of dialogue from various values that exist in society. The bureaucracy that provides public services must be accountable to society as a whole. Because the community is dynamic, the character of public services must also always change according to the development of society.
 * 3) Value citizens determined to make meaningful contributions to society. There are several benefits of involving citizens in policy-making process and these include: First, greater participation can help satisfy people's expectations that they are listened to and that their needs and interests are taken into account; Second, greater participation can improve the quality of public policies as governments tap into broader sources of information, creativity, and solutions; Third, greater participation in the policy process will facilitate implementation because participants care more about the results; Fourth, greater participation answers the call for greater transparency and accountability in government; Fifth, greater participation can increase public trust in government; Sixth, greater participation can help meet the challenges of an emerging information society; Seventh, greater participation can create opportunities to develop new partnerships; Eighth, greater participation can lead to a better informed public; Ninth, in a democracy, it is simply the right thing to do.
 * 4) Think strategically and act democratically. Policies and programs that meet the needs of the constituents can be most effectively and responsibly implemented through collective action and collaboration. The New Public Service is not just about creating a vision and delegating it to the government to implement, but about bringing all stakeholders together to design and implement programs that move toward the desired goals or direction.
 * 5) Recognize that accountability isn’t simple. Government officials should not just worry about the market. They must also consider laws and constitutions, community values, political norms, professional standards, and citizens' interests.
 * 6) Serve rather than steer. Public servants need to share value-based leadership by helping people express and realize their interests rather than steering them in a new direction that is not necessarily consistent with their roles and interests. Interacting and engaging with citizens gives purpose and meaning to public services.
 * 7) Value people, not just productivity. Public institutions and the networks they participate in are more likely to succeed in the long term if they are managed by processes of cooperation and shared governance based on respect for all.  In the New Public Service, all citizens have the same right to receive the same quality of service from bureaucrats. The interests of society must take precedence, even if they conflict with productivity values.

The Book
The book "New Public Service: Serving, Not Steering," written by Dr. Janet V. Denhardt and Dr. Robert B. Denhardt, was first published in 2000. This book is considered one of the seminal works that contributed to the development and popularization of the New Public Service model in the field of public administration. The book is published in four (4) editions, the latest was published in 2015. Their prominent article has the same title “The New Public Service: Serving Rather than Steering” was originally published in Public Administration Review in the year 2000 and was chosen as one of the 75 most influential papers out of more than 3,500 articles published in the said journal since 1940.