Assessment of Trends in Civil Service: Methodological Issues

Abstract

The article analyzes the development trend of the system of the federal civil service in Russia with using the program-target method. The relevance is due to defects in planning practice in the past years and the need to improve its efficiency in the future.
To test the hypothesis it is proposed to assess the overall dynamics of the civil service with a number of objective statistical indicators. All the latest period of development of the national civil service system in 1991–2014 was divided into periods that do not implement programs of public service development ( a control group), and years of implementation of these programs (an experimental group).
We tested the hypothesis that the use of the program-target method contributes to the development of the civil service system, which manifests itself in improving performance of its internal functioning and more closely in the overall dynamics of the national development. These trends are determined by using a factor analysis and a principal component analysis.
It was found that during the implementation of the federal public service reform program (especially in 2003–2007 and in 2009–2010) a closer, than in other years, statistical relationship between the indices of internal and external development and at the same time increased indexes data were revealing. It is concluded that the implemented program had an overall positive impact on the development of civil service. In the years, when there were no programs, a negative trend in the development of civil service was marked. We recommend the implementation of some criteria, focusing on the achievement of an external socio-economic impact, and the establishment of these documents with national priorities in new programs for civil service.