Kakha Bendukidze outlines his experiences and personal views about downsizing Georgia’s civil service and reducing the number of government agencies, functions and employees. He argues that the traditional model of civil service promotion and tenure is not appropriate in the fluid political and economic context of Georgia. He suggests that reforms cannot be sequenced formally. Rather, the opportunities for reform fluctuate with political circumstances and must be seized when they present themselves.  He explains how budget reforms were used as instruments to reduce the size of the civil service and the functions of Georgia’s government.    

Case Study:  Delivering on the Hope of the Rose Revolution: Public Sector Reform in Georgia, 2004-2009

Jaba Ebanoidze talks about the reform of Georgia's Public Registry office, an agency that records all information associated with property ownership in the country. Under his tenure, the office streamlined various processes and undertook the computerization of all records and applications. This has allowed citizens to submit applications through the Internet and track the progress of their applications. Ebanoidze hired top Georgian programmers to develop a Georgia-specific software system.  He looked at other countries in Europe, drawing inspiration from Estonia and taking lessons from places where he felt things didn’t work so well. He raised salaries of his key staff so as not to lose them to the private sector, while at the same time he worked on institutionalizing procedures so they were not person-specific. He also discusses the challenges and successes in extending the new system to rural and outlying areas. Ebanoidze talks about training a core group of people to work with new systems, and then unrolling it slowly. He was able to minimize expenses by having a training team go from region to region rather than trying to train all regions simultaneously. He also talks about successful attempts to combat corruption by minimizing citizen-staff interaction, and through the more direct means of firing staff resistant to increased transparency.

Case Study:  Rejuvenating the Public Registry: Republic of Georgia, 2006-2008

Zurab Nogaideli, who was prime minister of Georgia from 2005 to 2007, details the country's experience of reform generally and civil service reform in particular.  He discusses the challenges that confronted the country after the Rose Revolution in 2003, and talks about efforts made to downsize the civil service and reduce corruption.  He emphasizes that simpler systems work better in developing countries, and that fewer people with better training and higher pay do a better job than a greater number of individuals who are poorly paid and poorly trained.  He favors simple regulations that do not foster interaction between mid-level bureaucrats and citizens, believing that frequent interaction encourages corruption.  Nogaideli believes that Georgia had four years of excellent reform from 2003 to 2007, but that gradually some successes were eroded.  He maintains this demonstrates the importance of continuing on a strong reform course even after early achievements.  He offers reasons for what he perceives as backsliding on reforms, and provides advice for countries that want to move forward.

Case Study:  Delivering on the Hope of the Rose Revolution: Public Sector Reform in Georgia, 2004-2009