Question

COUNTRY = FINLAND These answers may be harder to find, but do the best you can. Try to find an organization chart of Finlands executive branch agencies. Link or post or paste the chart for an overview of the bureaucracy. In Finland, to whom are civil servants (bureaucrats) accountable? In the U.S., the bureaucracy is the arm of government that implements and regulates policies decided on by elected officials. In theory, the administrative branch in the U.S. is professional (other than top leadership), not political. How does this work in Finland? In other words, are civil service appointments political or based on merit or a combination of both? How are civil servants trained? How are they promoted? How is success of the bureaucracy measured? In Finland, do citizens go to the bureaucracy for individual help or is the bureaucracy “neutral,” carrying out orders in a neutral manner? Do you think this reflects the type of government that you identified?

Answer 1

Finland's Executive branch includes:

• President
• Cabinet, headed by Prime Minister

Apart from these, there are certain Ministries like, Ministry of Education and Culture, Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment of Finland and Ministry of Finland and Central Agencies and institutions that work as part of the government, such as, National Institute for Health and Welfare, Finnish National agency for Education, Statistics Finland, The National Audit Office of Finland.

In Finland, responsibility of public services are shared between Central government and municipalities. The civil servants, thus, are accountable to their concerned Ministry and ultimately to the President and Supreme Court. More over, civil service in Finland is not considered as a separate entity, rather it works with the government.

Article 84 of the Constitution states about the recruitment to the civil services. And appointments are made by the President.

Civil service appointments in Finland is based upon, "skill, ability and proved virtue"

The success of bureaucracy is one of the highest, which is also evident from the fact that Finland is less corrupted country, as most of the process are digitized.