Government competitiveness

Government competitiveness^[1][2][3] is a new concept created by Tobin Im,^[4] a scholar of public administration and a professor at the Graduate School of Public Administration at Seoul National University. Since 2011, Center for Government Competitiveness (CGC) at Seoul National University has developed the Government Competitiveness (GC) index which evaluates government achievements in the various fields and furthermore provides policy recommendations to increase competitiveness of government in the future.

Description

Government competitiveness (GC) is often confounded with similar concepts. One of the prominent examples is national competitiveness. A variety of institutions have developed indices measuring the level of national competitiveness. Two indices, the World Competitiveness Scoreboard (WCS)^[5] developed by the International Institute for Management Development (IMD)^[6] and the Global Competitiveness Index (GCI)^[7] built by the World Economic Forum (WEF)^[8] have come to dominate the field of competitiveness studies.

The International Institute for Management Development WCS and the World Economic Forum the Global Competitiveness Index view national competitiveness akin to how business-friendly a nation is, and focus upon economic and market indicators. As such, if a nation is a good place for foreign firms to do business and make money, it will, as a result, also be viewed as competitive. Following this logic, the role played by government then, is mainly restricted to constructing an environment that is attractive to businesses.^[9]

Emphasizing the broader fields of government activities, several institutions have started to develop indicators emphasizing the role of government in driving development and national competitiveness. Prominent examples include The World Bank’s Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI)^[10] and the Quality of Government Institute’s (QGI) (the University of Gothenburg) Quality of Government indicators(QoG).^[11]

While these two indices constitute important steps toward improving our understanding of how government contributes toward competitiveness, they have also revealed numerous theoretical and methodological shortcomings related to the study of governments’ role in fostering national competitiveness.^[12]

Since 2011, Center for Government Competitiveness (director: Tobin Im) has developed the GC index mainly focusing on government capacities and roles in national development.^[13] After investigating the limited capabilities of existing competitiveness indicators to define and measure the level of GC, the CGC has tried to develop a novel approach to conceptualizing and measuring GC.^[14] According to Ho and Im (2012), the concept of GC can be defined as “the power of government to, in light of various constraints, take resources from in and outside of the country and improve social, economic and cultural conditions of the nation in order to sustainably enhance citizens’ quality of life.” Moreover, the concepts of ‘constraints’ and ‘quality of life’^[15] can be interpreted in various ways, depending on a nation’s unique environments.

The CGC builds the GC index based on David Easton’s system theory as a theoretical framework.^[16] Therefore, the GC index has four sub-factors: a) input, b) throughput, c) output, and d) outcome. To measure government roles and activities in varies fields beyond economic growth, each GC sub-factor includes 339 variables measured in ten fields of government activities: a) economy, b) education, c) health and welfare, d) agriculture and food, e) general government, f) research & development (R&D), g) information and communications technology (ICT), h) energy and environment, i) culture and tourism, and j) disaster management.

Figure 1.Easton’s system theory

By considering different experiences and policy practice between developed countries and developing countries,^[17] the CGC measures the level of government competitiveness by applying different criteria to the OECD and to non-OECD countries. For non-OECD countries, the eight fields of government activities are included. Specifically, the six fields of government activities, economy, education, health and welfare, agriculture and food, energy and environment, and ICT, are commonly applied to the OECD and non-OECD countries. Two more fields, the internal workings of government and overall activities of government, are included.

OECD rankings in 2014

Rank	Countries	GC score
1	United States	0.650
2	Netherlands	0.620
3	Sweden	0.619
4	Finland	0.609
5	Norway	0.602
6	Switzerland	0.587
7	Denmark	0.587
8	United Kingdom	0.575
9	Germany	0.574
10	New Zealand	0.569
11	Australia	0.565
12	Canada	0.555
13	Luxembourg	0.550
14	Iceland	0.548
15	Japan	0.543
16	France	0.521
17	Austria	0.517
18	South Korea	0.516
19	Belgium	0.512
20	Ireland	0.503
21	Israel	0.479
22	Estonia	0.470
23	Spain	0.429
24	Portugal	0.406
25	Slovenia	0.404
26	Italy	0.385
27	Czech Republic	0.382
28	Chile	0.379
29	Hungary	0.361
30	Poland	0.353
31	Slovakia	0.344
32	Greece	0.308
33	Turkey	0.300
34	Mexico	0.264

Non-OECD rankings in 2014

Rank	Countries	GC score
1	Singapore	0.705
2	South Korea	0.668
3	Lithuania	0.619
4	Uruguay	0.602
5	Costa Rica	0.590
6	Qatar	0.587
7	Latvia	0.577
8	Malaysia	0.564
9	Croatia	0.560
10	Georgia	0.554
11	Tunisia	0.548
12	Bahrain	0.545
13	Brazil	0.538
14	Thailand	0.523
15	Colombia	0.519
16	Oman	0.519
17	Kazakhstan	0.516
18	Rwanda	0.512
19	Mongolia	0.508
20	Vietnam	0.508
21	China	0.503
22	Sri Lanka	0.502
23	Argentina	0.501
24	El Salvador	0.495
25	Azerbaijan	0.485
26	India	0.478
27	Peru	0.478
28	Ukraine	0.478
29	Morocco	0.477
30	Russia	0.475
31	Indonesia	0.473
32	Ghana	0.469
33	Kuwait	0.466
34	Guatemala	0.455
35	Ecuador	0.455
36	Honduras	0.451
37	Philippines	0.449
38	Paraguay	0.447
39	Senegal	0.440
40	Bolivia	0.434
41	Egypt	0.433
42	Kenya	0.429
43	Cambodia	0.425
44	Tanzania	0.424
45	Timor-Leste	0.423
46	Uzbekistan	0.418
47	Zambia	0.416
48	Uganda	0.412
49	Ethiopia	0.411
50	Nepal	0.405
51	Laos	0.394
52	Mozambique	0.393
53	Algeria	0.390
54	Burkina Faso	0.381
55	Bangladesh	0.373
56	Mali	0.367
57	Pakistan	0.353
58	Cameroon	0.347
59	Nigeria	0.320
60	Democratic Republic of the Congo	0.250

• Korea is exceptionally included in the non-OECD cases for a reference point
• GC scores are rounded off to four decimal places. Therefore, the countries which seem to have the same scores have, in fact, different scores.

See also

• Competitiveness
• the Global Competitiveness Index
• World Competitiveness Yearbook
• The World Bank’s Worldwide Governance Indicators

References

External links

• Center for Government Competitiveness
• Tobin Im