One of the crucial roles that the modern state has come to assume is the provision of welfare services. Today, the latter constitute an important component of government business and, very often, parties in power are benchmarked not only on their ability to provide such services but also on the quality of the services provided.

These services form part of the social rights of citizens as opposed to the civil and political rights. They impose upon the State obligations to provide entitlements such as housing, social security and education. Social rights have been institutionalised with the development of the Welfare State whose essence is captured in Harold L. Wilensky?s definition: ?Government-protected minimum standards of income, nutrition, health, housing, education, assured to every citizen as a right, not charity.? During the post-world war period, this concept of the State as responsible, benevolent and protective appealed to a wide range of thinkers and became known as the ?post-war liberal consensus.?

In recent years, however, with the advent of globalisation, the Welfare State has come under attack from different quarters. According to the neo-liberals, for example, the Welfare State is: uneconomical and expensive, leading to government ?overload?; (ii) unproductive, giving rise to growth of public bureaucracy; (iii) inefficient as it leads to poor delivery of services because of a monopolistic situation; (iv) ineffective, as it creates a cycle of dependency; (v) despotic, as it leads to the control of individual citizens by an overweening state and denies freedom of choice with its compulsory provision of services; and, finally, it gives rise to rent-seeking.

What, in fact, is rent-seeking? It is the tendency on the part of bureacrats to indulge in ?empire-building?, to seek ways and means to buy time, to go for long-winded procedures, to ask for an endless list of documents before providing a service, to call a beneficiary several times to the office, each time asking for a different document, to opt for red tape, to send a letter received today to the Registry to be filed the next day and returned to the officer the day after, to work out a draft and send it to the typing pool to be typed again the day after and despatched the following day, etc. Meanwhile, ?cabri manze salade?. Examples of rent-seeking are legion in the Civil service. Very often, however, the officers are not to be blamed as the whole system itself operates in an anachronistic way.

Reviewing the system

If we are to keep pace with development, we have no other alternative than to overhaul the system. Let us take as example the provision of wheelchairs. At present, a person needing such an assisting device has to get a medical certificate to produce when he applies for one at the local social security office. His documents are sent to the Headquarters where his case is processed and his name put on a waiting list. The Ministry of Social Security then tenders for the bulk purchase of wheelchairs abroad. Orders are placed and procedures followed, including clearance from the CTB. Once purchased, the weelchairs have to be cleared at Customs, stored and then distributed one by one to the beneficiairies. All this costs a lot in terms of man-days, time and resources. Wouldn?t it be easier to just issue a voucher to the client, who would exercise his freedom of choice, while divesting the Ministry of unnecessary and cumbersome tasks? Could not the same principle apply to provision of other such services?

The common complaint is that there is too much delay and too much red tape in the case of pensions and allowances. It is futile to describe the long-winded procedures and difficulties caused to needy persons. The following non-apocryphal anecdote, symptomatic of the disease called rent-seeking, clearly illustrates the predicament of the common people. A young lady, victim of a road accident, had her two legs amputated. After going through all the procedures, she was seen, after 2 or 3 months, by a medical board. She received, after 2 or more months, a letter informing her that she had been awarded a pension? for one year! This means that, after one year, she will have to start the formalities and be seen by the Board again to know whether she will continue getting that pension. The lady mused: ?Do they think my legs will grow after one year?? This question indicts the system unquestionably.

In this globalisation era, the provision of welfare cannot continue as it is used to be. There is a need for streamlining of procedures. There is a need for empowering consumers of government services. There is a need for ?enabling? officers to decide and act promptly. And, above all, there is an urgent need for acting more as a facilitator rather than as a direct provider of services. A rethinking of the whole system has become a must.

A. BANKUR