Section ID:96 Section title: Comparative perspectives on the management and organization of the public sector Panel title: Reforming welfare states; accountability, democracy and management Title of the proposed paper: Welfare reforms in transition countries: between public efficiency and social justice Ciucanu Ioana-Raluca Beneficiary of the „Doctoral Scholarships for a Sustainable Society” project , project co-financed by the European Union through the European Social Fund, Sectoral Operational Programme Human Resources and Development 2007-2013” Ph.D candidate Political Science Institution: Bucharest, National School of Political Science and Administrative Studies Email adress: ioana.ciucanu@gmail.com The neoliberal ideological wave of the 80’s which had captured several countries in the world, like USA, United Kingdom, New Zealand and Australia, has shifted attention from traditional bureaucratic thinking and practice to strategic public management as well as an endless quest for public performance measurement and efficiency, all these types of reform measures being comprised in the suggestive label of New Public Management. For Central and East European former communist countries, reform strategies according to this new public philosophy of NPM have been formulated and implemented in the 90’s, a process which has continued even in the 2000’s. Due to the fact that administrative reforms are at an incipient stage, its long term effects are quite difficult to stress out at this moment, but short term consequences can already be discerned. The aim of this paper is to explore the relationship between administrative reforms undergone in European transition countries from the view of NPM and matters concerning social justice and welfare. In particular, I am interested in the content and effects of these reforms as they relate to welfare sectors like education policies, namely the way in which NPM reform guidelines formulated and implemented by the public authorities guarantees equal acccess to educational resources. The argument I stress here refers to the fact that the special emphasis on public efficiency and the use of generalised public performance measurement indicators, main features of NPM reform guidelines, preclude aspects concerning social justice and welfare, such as equal access of certain social groups to public education. Thus, the paper analyses in a comparative perspective both the content and the level of implementation of the administrative reforms suggested through public programmes, policy documents and external institution public reports (IMF, World Bank, European Comission) as well as its welfare effects in education sector across two East European transition countries, Romania and Bulgaria.
