Government Studies Short Hand Notes
Government Studies Short Hand Notes
Government Studies Short Hand Notes
GOVERNMENT STUDIES
WHAT IS POLITICS?
This implies that the alternative is some form of violent means of settling
differences; such as revolution, civil war or simply armed struggle, while in politics
the clash of ideas and interest is resolved through legal, organised methods which
have been agreed by which a state is governed.
OBJECTIVES
➢ Define politics
➢ Define political science
➢ Briefly describe the historical development of political science
➢ Discuss the methods of political science
➢ Explain the importance of political science in issues of national development
UNIT 02: THE STATE AND CIVIL SOCIETY
There are two concepts in this unit that you should know and understand:
ITNRODUCTION
• What is a state?
• Apart from dealing with the state, political science looks at the
relationship between the state and society over which it exercises
its authority or power or rule;
• Is the state natural or artificial institution?
• How does it come to be?
• How much power does it have vis-à-vis society?
• How does it relate with society?
• Can society control the action of the state?
WHAT IS A STATE?
The state refers to the permanent institutions which exercise sovereign power
within a defined territory. Sovereign power may be defined as the monopoly of the
right to enforce laws. These institutions are permanent in the sense that they do not
change when a new government is elected or when new political leaders replace
existing ones.
Answer:
(a) Decision making structures. These include the executive arm of the
government ; the legislature and political parties.
(b) Decision enforcing institutions. These include bureaucracies, parastatals
organisation, the police and security forces.
(c) Decision mediating in bodies. These include courts, tribunals and
investigating commissions.
1. Do you think that civil society in Namibia has power to influence public
policy? Support your answer with examples
Answer
Human rights societies might influence public policy by crying out like the
abortion bill that has been put on hold because of opposition from
churches, amongst others.
2. What makes up civil society in Namibia? Can you list some examples of
social groups or organisations that help make up civil society in Namibia?
Answer
INTRODUCTION
WHAT IS DEMOCRACY?
Democracy has several meanings, and this word democracy is constantly use on a
daily basis both in government and by ordinal citizens or people.
The word democracy comes from the Greek term demkratia, where “demos”
mean people and “kratos” means rule.
Some scholars argue that democracy does not mean rule by the people. It
is more than that. It is a philosophy of human kind, a way of life, a set of
ideals and attitudes motivating and guiding the behaviour of members of
society towards one another, not only on their political life, but in their
economic, social and cultural relationships as well (Rodee, Anderson and
Christol,1957:83)
Of course no single political regime could hope to meet such stringent conditions in
all respect and without some failings. Nevertheless, they do serve as a useful
yardstick against which we can assess the democratic credentials of any state.
While it may seem remote, the situation in Zimbabwe holds important lessons on
political accommodation and tolerance for young democracies like Namibia, the key
lesson being that by refusing to accommodate the opposition in a constitutional
way, ruling parties can derail democracies and create conditions for often
unworkable hybrid governments.
Robert Mugabe’s government squeezed the opposition out of its democratic space
by systematically changing the constitution, abridging public freedoms, denying
them access to public media, banning public meetings, political rallies and
eventually stifling all forms of legitimate opposition.
The opposition MDC and other non-state player’s campaign for democracy in
Zimbabwe had no other option but to rally the international community to impose
sanctions on Zimbabwe’s key leaders and bring pressure to bear on the
Zimbabwean government to respect the rule of law and accommodate the
opposition. Mugabe might try to play the blame game, but his agreement to settle
with the MDC is itself an admission of failure.
Mines and Energy Minister Erkki Nghimtina’s recent outbursts about his “SWAPO
money” directed at his nephew are a case in point. If we have ministers shooting at
their nephews, or any one for that matter for joining an opposition political party,
we have a long way to go in fostering tolerance of diversity and political maturity.
Recently, police had to be called in to escort Rally for Democracy and Progress
supporters after they clashed with SWAPO supporters in Tobias Hainyeko
constituency. Such incidents show lack of political maturity and are a threat to the
political stability of the country as a nation.
Even the trees of Ohangwena have fallen victim to political tensions, with party
loyalist threatening to cut down a tree because one party had hoisted its flag and
conducted meetings under it. This kind of pettiness detracts from the goals of
national development.
Having witnessed Zimbabwe’s rise and fall as a democracy and economic prosperity
in the region, Namibia should take lessons from the factors that led to the undoing
of Zimbabwe’s story. What has happened in Zimbabwe, like what happened in the
Democratic Republic of Congo, is a deviation from multiparty democracy due to
repression and intolerance, and although we might pontificate and praise the
leaders for sacrificing their selfish ambitions, the wishes of the people in Zimbabwe
and the letter and spirit of their constitution have been disregarded. DEMOCRACY
IS NOT NEGOTIABLE.
Questions 1
Use the three defining factors of democratic good governance to justify whether or
not there is democratic good governance in Namibia. Support your answer with
examples:
Question 2
What are the reasons that have led to the promotion of democratic good
governance?
Answer: with explanations
Question 3
What do you regard as the principle virtues of democracy? What are the dangers of
democracy? Motivate your answer.
Question 4
OBJECTIVES
INTRODUCTION
Although the word government can refer to the act of the governing and often does
so, the Government itself is a more specific term. It applies to those elected
ministers who claim the authority to run the state which is described above.
Institutions are permanent; the government, on the other hand, is transient
(temporary).It represent a temporary majority thrown up in Parliament by the result
of the previous general election. By their votes the people give it a temporary
mandate (authority) to control the institutions of the state, pass laws and administer
services in accordance with the manifesto which it put before them at the election.
As indicated above constitution offer sets of rules that help to define power
relationships and the operations of a state. Raney (1971:113) defines a constitution
as “...the whole body of fundamental rules, written and unwritten, legal
and extralegal, according to which a particular government operates” In
the same vein, strong (1972:10) defines a constitution as “...a collection of
principles according to which the power of government, the rights of the
government and the rights of the governed are related and mutually
adjusted.” Another simple definition is that offered by Chacek (1973:3). He
indicates that a constitution may be seen as a “...official blueprint for the use of
public power.” Fox and Mayer (1995:25) defined it as “...a framework of
government and the nature and extent of government authority.”
Blondel (1996:218) indicates that there are three broad principles on which
constitution is based: the principle of restraint; the principle of positive rights; and
the principle of egalitarian goals.
The principle of restraint: this is about the restriction placed on the executive so
that he could be tolerant, guard against abuse of power, and infringing upon the
rights of individuals. This is also known as constitutionalism where the “the power of
government should be limited so that the rights of man are formally protected from
abridgement by public officials or private individuals (Ranney, 1971:114). This
doctrine or fundamental principle strives for the ideal where the governors and
governed are all subject to the constitutional rules to prevent arbitrary exercise of
power (du Toit, 1996:73).
The principle of positive right: After the two world wars, it was imperative to
develop a set of positive rights to protect each state. These were regarded as logical
extensions of the liberation protection. They include social, economic and political
rights. These had to be entrenched in the constitution to protect individuals and the
centralizing tendency of the state.
The political system is influenced by its environment, both the national and
international environment. This includes all the factors within a given country and
outside it that can influence the operations of this system. These provide input to
the political system. Thus, the input phase is about the articulation of demands, i.e.
an activity where policy ideas are presented for discussion and subsequent
decision-making. The black box or governmental system or still, conversion box is in
charge of converting demands in into policy decisions. The output phase has three
distinct activities: rule implementation; rule making; rule adjudication.
• The first question is concerned with the degree to which those with
governmental authority allow people to participate in decision-making. This is
the essence of democracy.
• The second question is concerned with the means to the decision making
process, i.e. whether there is public discourse or open discussions or whether
these are curtailed in preference of centralised decision making.
• The third question is concerned with the ends, purpose or objectives of policy
decisions, i.e. what those who rule want to achieve or their fundamental
purpose.
The executive body is headed by the president, assisted by Cabinet. The president
is elected by direct popular vote for a term of five years and can be re-elected for a
second term of office. Parliament has approved an amendment to the Constitution
to allow the first President of Namibia to serve a third term. Elections were held in
December, 1999, and President Sam Nujoma served a third term.
The judicial structure in Namibia parallels that of South Africa. In 1919, Roman-
Dutch law was declared the common law of the territory and remains so up till now.
By law all indigenous groups are able to participate equally in decisions affecting
their lands, cultures, traditions, and natural resources. Nevertheless, the Bushmen,
or San, and other indigenous people have been unable to exercise fully these rights
as a result of minimal access to education and economic opportunities under
colonial rule, coupled with their relative isolation in remote areas of the country.
After independence the standard legal workweek was reduced from 46-45 hours
with no more than 10 hours overtime per week. In addition, the law mandates 24
consecutive days of annual leave and at least 30 workdays of sick leave per year.
The constitution and the fair Labour Act of 1992 provides for the freedom of
association, including the freedom to form and join trade unions, the right to
bargain collectively or individually, and other basic safeguards in the work place.
Roughly half of the wage sector is organized to some degree, although less than 20
percent of full-time wage owners are organized.
Namibia is a first asylum country and continues to permit asylum seekers to enter
the country. Ninety percent of the more than 2,200 refugees and asylum seekers
presently at the Osire camp are from Angola. The rest are from the Democratic
Republic of Congo, Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, and other African countries. Those
granted refugee status are permitted to work and attend school including the
University of Namibia.
Question
Answer
Question
Outline the powers, duties and functions of each one of the organs of the
state.
OBJECTIVES
INTRODUCTION
• Regional and local govt. entities are established to meet the
demands, needs and expectsions of people at local levels;
• They are entrusted with the responsibility of satisfying and
enhancing the quality of life of local communities through the
provision of basic services;
• While each national govt. exists to provide various goods and
services to the entire nation,
• It normally transfer some of its functions to regional and local govt.
institutions;
• Local govt. is better able to work with people at the grassroots level.
Local government concerns an area which is small enough that the inhabitants
consider themselves a community. This might be a group of villages, a town, a city
or part of a city, or a country.
OBJECTIVES
Questions
• PE have long been part of the public sector both in developed and
developing countries;
• At independence Namibian govt. faced with discourage task of
reactivating growth after a decade of essential stagnation;
• But growth alone was not enough
• Namibian national development objectives demanded growth of
employment;
• Establishing PE in order to improve distribution and fight poverty;
• These entities were viewed as instruments or vehicles for national
development;
• However, their history in these countries indicates that most of them
have not lived up to their expectations;
• This explains the change of thought by most political leaders who
now embrace privatisation as a way of addressing problems of poor
performance experienced by some of these entities.
OBJECTIVES
Question 1
Answer
Question 2
What are the main reasons for having Boards of Directors in Public Enterprises
Answer
INTRODUCTION
OBJECTIVES
For example, a few years back there was only one handyman at Rundu state
hospital who was responsible for carrying out all the minor repairs. All major repairs
were done by the ministry of work. And at this stage things haven’t change despite
the fact that the hospital managed to employ more handymen; all major repairs are
still being done by the same ministry.
The above mentioned state of affairs practically means that the ministry of health
has an agreement with the ministry of works. This is because the works ministry has
skilled employees, ranging from intensive training and experience.
Another scenario is that of the agreement between the Ministry of Defence and
Health. The ministry of defence recruits almost every year and the screening of all
the successful applicants are done at hospitals countrywide. The reason for this is
once again, skilled and qualified personnel. In addition, hospitals also have the
necessary machinery and equipment for X-ray screening and analysis of laboratory
samples (i.e. blood, urine for diabetes, hypertension and HIV/Aids). The ministry of
defence also have their own doctors and machinery (in short supply), so to save on
screening time they went into agreement with the MoHSS.
INTRODUCTION
OBJECTIVES
➢ Define administration and public administration
➢ Outline the nature and scope of public administration
➢ Identify and outline the role of public administrators
➢ Describe the reasons for studying public administration.
Question
Answer:
There are three primary reasons as to why a new public administration had to be
formed:
Firstly, the poor performance of public administration during the 70’s and
80’s
The new equation of government
Managerialism
According to the Secretary General, civil service strengths would be judged by its
ability to support national success, inspiration toward employees by encouraging a
responsible work tradition, the response to customer needs and demands and the
fostering of people, systems and structures that will lead to brilliant service
provision to the general public (Commonwealth Secretariat, 1995:6).
The important thing here is the fact that management is necessary for any
organization. It helps focus resources where benefits are greatest, eliminate waste
and keep accounts in check. It also provides clearance on goals and objectives while
keeping the employees motivated. For this kind of success, Pollit notes that
organizations which incorporate such ideals are more likely to succeed.
OBJECTIVES
OBJECTIVES
Provide the employee with the best implements to perform specific tasks
Analyse jobs and break them down into smaller or elementary units that can
performed repeatedly
Study a workman performing each of these tasks at a time and use a
stopwatch to time his motions
Discover and discard all unnecessary movements that are not connected with
the task
Carry out an extrapolation exercise of the time and motion data to come up
with what can be considered as the best method of performing the task.
(Sheldrake 1996 as cited in Nsingo 2004:289)
Taylor’s studies provided managers with well researched invaluable information on
how long each job would take rather than relying on the rules-of-thumb methods. It
was intended that this theory would be universally accepted and would apply to all
situations. He contended that to rationalise the jobs, one has to start at the lowest
level of the organisation. Taylor also suggested principles that would serve as a
basis for managing organisation, which are; finding one best way for performing
each job, scientific selection of personnel, financial incentives and functional
foremanship. According to Taylor, work systems can be designed for attainment of
efficiency, and this is if workers follow these systems. Managers can introduce a
piece rate system that will use to pay workers in line with a job that has been done.
To Taylor, work performance depends on ability, industriousness and astuteness of
the manager. Managers should motivatetheir subordinates, private appropriate
leadership and control organisation proceedings in a manner that would lead to
efficiency. This, organisations need to train and develop the management skill base
of their managers. Taylor’s major contention was not to dehumanise and exploit the
worker but to address the quest of compliance within the organisations. He was
more concerned with how to get each worker performing task to the best of their
abilities. According to Taylor, compliance could only be realised by coming up with a
scientific study of jobs performed by workers and letting them discover the
meaningful steps, through simplifying tasks and narrowly defining jobs.
This Frenchman has spent most of his time popularising his management theories.
In his major work of administration, he indicated that it was possible to devise a set
of principles of administration that would be universally applied to improve the
performance of management situation and would be enhance management
performance if applied appropriately in any organisation. These are;
Division of work
Discipline
Unity of direction
Unity of demand
Authority and responsibility
Subordination of the individuals interests to general interests
Remuneration of personnel
Centralisation
Order
Equity
Initiative
Esprit de corps or Unity in strength
Scalar chain of command
Stability and tenure of personnel
As it is reflecting in the principles, the underlining emphasis is organisation
efficiency, handling personnel properly and appropriate management action. Fayol
later developed “elements of management” that serves as integral part of
management functions:
Planning-Organising-Command-Coordination-Control
Fayol was more interested in the question of organisational design, although he also
touched the question of organisational compliance. This can be substantiated by his
advocacy of the 14 principles in which he proposed that an organisation would be
best be structured by a hierarchical structure. He termed this a scalar chain of
command whereby the line of authority flows from the top to the lowest rank.
Division of work and centralised structures are some of the principles that would
bring about increased output and make employees more effective. In terms of the
compliance, he proposed as a core tenet for the employee to obey and respect rules
that govern the organisation. He maintained that discipline and compliance would
be enhanced if there were a good relationship between management and the
workers. There should also be a judicious use of penalties for infarctions of the rules.
He emphasised the factors like collaborations and specialisation.
Max Webber was a professor, whose interest where in law, politics, economics,
history and sociology. He wrote extensively on authority and legitimacy though at
the time of his death, none of his work was available in English. He argued that
obedience was owed to the impersonal order established by law. Thus, the authority
that any individual possessed came from the appointment or office held and not
from essential personal attributes. In case of traditional authority by contrast,
obedience was owed to the actual person of the leader who occupies the
traditionally sanctioned position of authority and who is bound by tradition. Weber
also claimed that with charismatic authority, obedience sprang from the leaders
personal qualities that at their highest, would amount to the gift of grace. Weber
views that the legal authority was associated with the establishment of bureaucracy.
Division of labour
Hierarchy of authority and responsibility
Merit employment
Rules and regulations
Impartiality or impersonality
Promotion system based on seniority
Discipline and control
OBJECTIVES
➢ Define a theory
➢ Describe the relationship between organisation theory and public
administration
➢ Provide a description of the different categories through which organisation
theory has evolved
➢ Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the different theories of
organisations as they apply to public administration.
OBJECTIVES
Question
Briefly discuss any five factors that influence the environment and show how they
impinge (impose) on your organisation. Give examples in each case.