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The Reform Agenda in the Northern Ireland Civil Service

The Influences of Parity, Integration, Devolution and Direct Rule

University of Ulster, UK

This article examines the impact of the reform and modernization agenda of the United Kingdom Home Civil Service on the Northern Ireland Civil Service, which has always existed as a separate civil service. It seeks to identify the differentiation in responses to the main UK reform initiatives in recent years and, in particular, to consider in this context the first comprehensive reform document to be produced by the Northern Ireland Civil Service, which appeared in 2004. A typology of four different influences is examined to explain the diversity of responses categorized as parity, integration, devolution and direct rule. Consideration is given to the significance of a separate civil service in the pattern of adjustments to Home Civil Service reforms and in facilitating other distinctive approaches. Comment is also made on the possible relevance of Northern Ireland experience to the absence of a separate civil service in Scotland and Wales following devolution.

Key Words: Civil Service • devolution • Northern Ireland • reform

Public Policy and Administration, Vol. 22, No. 3, 275-288 (2007)
DOI: 10.1177/0952076707078759


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