Quality of government, public service delivery and institutional impartiality in ethnically polarised societies: evidence for policy makers

Abstract

Empirical studies support the argument that the quality of government, institutional performance and institutional impartiality are likely to have an impact on minorities in accessing legally mandated welfare services. It is also argued that diminished form of citizenship, discriminatory laws and policy practices could remain a barrier for minorities to enjoy public services in diverse societies. The article explores these different arguments with empirical evidence and explicates in what ways the quality of government, administrative impartiality and institutional performance influence access to public services for the plantation community of Sri Lanka based on qualitative evidence collected for a three-year research project. The article finds that the policy implementation process and practices have a substantial influence on the quality of government, institutional impartiality and citizenship rights of minorities.

Keywords:

• quality of government
• institutional impartiality
• institutional performance
• citizenship
• policy practices
• plantation community
• Sri Lanka

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Funding

This article is a part of my PhD research entitled “Quality of Governance, Citizenship Rights and Public Service Delivery in Sri Lanka,” which was financially supported by the Norwegian Programme for Capacity Development in Higher Education and Research for Development (NORHED) Project on Policy and Governance Studies in South Asia. The author also would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions to further improve this article.