The Career System

The career system is influenced by the intellectual tradition of German idealism and the concept of the state of the philosopher G.W.F.Hegel (1770-1831). Hegel declared that universal standards should apply to the selection, training, and promotion of civil servants. Appointments to state jobs should be made only on the basis of the objective evaluation of the candidates' knowledge and ability.

In the German idealist tradition the state is conceived as separate from society, which it overseas with the aims of protecting the general interest against individual interests. The theoretical separating if state and society is complemented by the division of tasks between governments, cutes them. The career system, by establishing a lifelong professional relationship between the civil servant and the state, and by subordinating the civil servant to legitimate political authorities, satisfies the mission of the Hegelian state to function as an ideal, impartial arbiter of conflicting societal interests. The civil servant does not have the same status as employees in the private sector but has a special relation to the state, which brings additional duties and fewer freedoms, such as the duty of subordination to the political will of the government and, commonly, limitations on the freedom to strike. The additional burden of obligations imposed on civil servants in theoretically, at least- balanced by increased job security and a respectable salary.

The career system is applied in the public administrations of most Western European states (including France and the United Kingdom) and many postcolonial, independent civil servants are recruited on the basis of examinations of hiring graduates of Oxford and Cambridge Universities with nontechnical education; they reach the top echelons of civil service through a "fast stream" of promotions. Civil servants generally advance in their careers by acquiring experience on the job.

The British career system was solidified after the Northolt-Trevelyan report of 1854, which helped to extinguish the particularize and clienteles that had been evident in the British administration. Later, the British civil service developed into a polymorphous and fragmented set of bodies of civil servants, known as classes. The Fulton report, published in 1968, contributed to the reshaping of the career system by recommending a decrease in the number of classes, a wider pool of candidates for the top positions in the civil service hierarchy, and more specialized in-service training through the establishment of the Civil Service College. However, despite the Fulton committee recommendations, the British civil service was not thoroughly reformed; it remained deficient in openness and accountability.

In France civil servants are also recruited on the basis of examinations. Prospective high level civil servants are trained in an elite school, the Cole National d'Administration. The school, founded in 1945, administers highly competitive entrance examinations, offers coerces leading to specialization, and ranks the members of the graduating class. Under the ranking system civil servants are assigned to different grinds corps and to the levels of positions they will occupy in the bureaucracy. Differentiation along the grade scale provides for greater mobility of civil servants in the hierarchy of positions.

In Germany civil servants are recruited on the basis of competition; initially, they are appointed for a probationary stage, they become career civil servants. Depending on their formal qualifications and the type of job, civil servants are classified into several categories, forming a hierarchy. There is a long tradition of legal education among German civil servants. Not all public employees have the same legal status: the German state has a federal structure, and the competent states (Lander) hire some employees on a contract basis. Civil servants have a special relationship to the state, regulated by provisions of the public interest.