Rationalе for establishing the Hub
Constructing an effective civil service system, with a professional corps of civil servants able to meet today’s demands and challenges, is a key factor in any country’s striving for sustainable development. Meeting the needs of people today, without compromising those of future generations, requires governance to rise to new levels of effectiveness and develop new capacities for integrated policy-making around a clear vision for sustainable development.
Countries that have been successful in pursuing a sustained development path, have all been able to harness the capacities of their civil services at the national and sub-national levels as the engine for transformative change and for building prosperous societies.
The proposal for the establishment of a Regional Hub of Civil Service as a multilateral platform to reform the civil services has been inspired by the Agency of Civil Service Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan jointly with UNDP in Kazakhstan, based on the following premises:
- Regional co-operation networks help increase the effectiveness of the civil service systems of its participating countries; and
- As a structure for cooperation and regional information exchange, the Regional Hub can become a joint virtual work platform for all participants.
The CIS region’s experience over recent decades has also shown that securing positive outcomes through reform of the civil service relies on more than legislation ‘on paper’ and national public debate. Success also requires strong capacity development to implement reform, extensive knowledge management and experience exchange with countries in similar situations through “civil and public service excellence hubs”.
A number of excellence hubs have been established across continents and countries, with the purpose of building innovative and flexible systems for strengthening regional networking and cooperation. These entities favour exchange of existing experience, training programmes and best practices, supporting countries in the region in building their research capacities.
Such hubs play an important role in enhancing bilateral and multilateral cooperation between countries, enabling them to share accumulated experience in developing civil service systems, while supporting regional cooperation.
Welcome address by N. Nazarbayev, President of Kazakhstan at the ACSH Founding conference
