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The COVID-19 pandemic has brought significant changes to the daily lives of citizens, their interactions with their communities, the nongovernmental sector and the public administration, as well as threatening the continuity of the civic initiatives they had developed. This paper draws on the scientific literature on public participation and uses qualitative methods of inquiry (semi-structured interviews) to explore how external factors, in this case the COVID-19 pandemic, affected the public participation of citizens organised in civic initiative groups in Bucharest, Romania. One key contribution of the study pertains to the interplay between practice and the conceptual level of public participation. In this respect, the results showed that many members of civic group perceive it to be genuinely contradictory in practice in their definitions of public participation. However, their ideal visions of public participation in genuine democratic politics are markedly collaborative. The research showed that the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on civic groups has been quite limited, adding obstacles to public participation but also enabling opportunities. In particular, it can be concluded that the pandemic has exacerbated pre-existing challenges. It should also be noted that co-creation of public services can be defined by a certain level of continuity, especially in the case of civic groups that were involved in co-initiation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides an account of the transformational capacity of Romanian public administration in relation to four main aspects: (1) human resource performance and integrity; (2) territorial, functional and institutional decentralization; (3) public policies and (4) capitalizing on the digital and innovative component. The Romania case study highlights the gradual transformation of public administration in the last 30 years, as a reaction to the emergence of economic, social and political crises. For an imperative and irreversible change, we have identified directions for capitalizing on opportunities and good practices in the matter, in the context of the intensified integration process in NATO and the EU. We have analyzed the strategic documents on strengthening and accelerating the transformation of public administration and highlighted the need for the interconnection and interdependence of its four pillars to meet the specific objectives of Horizon 2030. For decision-makers, practitioners and researchers, this article aims to stimulate and contribute to the dedicated public debate and consultation of coherent, predictable and sustainable legislation and practices in the matter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This present research brings into focus the figure of the prefect and wojewód seen at the crossroads between career public servants representing the interests of the Government and political agents, appointed and dismissed at the whim of the Prime Minister. This paper approaches the issue of the holder of the prefect's office in Romania and Poland employing a prosopographic analysis and applies a Multiple Linear Regression (MLR) on select items in order to identify the general trend and particularities of their profiles. This institution was structured and articulated at the confluence of some administrative and political actions and integrated in the national institutional framework as a key actor, which continues to connect the institutional capacity of the state and the political capacity of the Government. Moving beyond the legal framework and institutional design of each country, we look at the profile - involving educational, professional and political affiliation - of the people actually appointed to this position in order to ascertain the weight of each of these factors when called to serve in office. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In addition to the involvement of public administration (PA) as a catalyst for economic development, today we are witnessing the need to enhance innovation in PA itself, with a commitment to maximizing efficiency, effectiveness, performance, and to improve quality of public service. In PA, the emerging theory of innovation represents a combined effort between conventional organizational innovation tools such as strategic planning and modern ones such as Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and e-governance. With regard to this challenging situation, this paper seeks to present a substantial literature concerning the theory of innovation, New Public Management (NPM), ICT, and e-governance. Furthermore, using a qualitative approach based on centered semi-structured interviews, this article illustrates the current activities conducted by the Lebanese government, specifically the Office of Ministry of State for Administrative Reform (OMSAR), compared by data gathered from platforms and databases from Romanian PA such as Ministry of Communication and Information Society, OECD, DESI index, and Eurostat on ICT and e-governance at European level. The paper results reveal the significant effect of innovation in Romanian PA paving the road toward facing the challenge to achieve its digital 2020 agenda and contributing to transparency, efficiency, effectiveness, community participation, and development of public service. However, Lebanese PA should join and shake hands to strengthen the adoption of innovation in its public corridors and should cross the notion of "still born" application of ICT to a fruitful implementation contributing to strategic innovation in public services and improved PA efficiency and performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper analyses the leadership styles practiced in Romania's Prefectures Institutions and the impact of gender on it. The purpose is to analyze if the leadership practiced by civil servants from top management is the effective one as well as if female leaders are perceived as being better leaders than men are. The main objective of the study is to establish which are the leadership styles practiced predominantly and the differences between men and women when occupying leadership positions. The methodology of research consists of an opinion survey conducted in the 42 Prefectures (the institutions that represent the Government in each County) of Romania using a questionnaire. The questionnaire measured two types of effective leadership behaviors: transformational and transactional and one ineffective style, namely laissez-faire (Howell, Avolio, 1993). The research revealed that the leaders from the studied institutions are presenting mostly transformational and transactional characteristics and lower scores at the passive leadership behaviors, which makes them effective leaders. A direct relation between gender and the leadership styles practiced could not be established due to the fact that the civil servants considered that men and women behave almost the same when occupying the same leadership position. The study also revealed that the majority of the respondents (over 70%) did not have a preference regarding leaders' gender. Even if the research did not show that women are better leaders than men, the fact that they are perceived as being transformational leaders leads to the idea that female leaders are effective leaders capable of making public institutions more modern, resilient and performant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The civil servants' training process plays a key role in developing the public employees' skills and broadening their vision. The present paper seeks to examine the perception of Employment Agencies' civil servants regarding the effectiveness of training programs, measured through their impact on the number of projects initiated and implemented under Sectorial Operational Programme for Human Resources Development 2007-2013. The role of training programs in enhancing civil servants' innovation capacity is also investigated. The methodology consists in an analysis of 253 projects financed by the European Social Fund (ESF) during 2009-2015 and an empirical research using a representative sample of 337 civil servants who attended EU funded training courses in project management. The conclusions of this paper indicated a direct relation between the number of projects developing training courses in 'project management' and the number of projects initiated and implemented annually by the territorial Agencies for Employment. Moreover, a positive correlation between the training programs and the innovation capacity of civil servants from County Agencies for Employment was also identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]