Improving Administrative Performance in Malaysia: The More Difficult Next Steps in Reform

Abstract

Despite past reforms, the Malaysian bureaucracy has lagged behind rising expectations. This paper reviews past reforms and suggests changes in reform strategy and measures for improving both the capacity and the will of public officials needed to raise administrative performance to meet domestic and global pressures. Combining technological and political perspectives, it argues that improving the will of public officials is both more important and more difficult than improving their capacity. Improving the will to perform promises significant gains in performance, but it requires reforms, mainly strengthening public control and making the bureaucracy more representative, that entail significant sacrifice of the interests of entrenched elites and groups. Malaysia has reached a juncture where she has to confront politically more difficult choices in administrative reform than in the past.