Degeneration of Public Services: A Strategic Commitment to Ignorance

(Paperback)

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The book argues that the delivery of effective, efficient, and equitable public services to the citizens is essentially a Human Rights issue. Yet, and especially since the 1970s, there has been a pervasive and constant denying of the concept of Public Good. This negation of this notion emanates from a variety of factors: indifference, callousness,, bigotry, hatred, xenophobia, lack of education, and Ignorance. These dangerous trends, if not challenged and rectified, will soon lead to the demise of the American dream and the country's purported exceptionalism. Given this basic premise, the State has a moral, legal, political, social, and economic obligation to its citizensparticularly to the downtrodden, vulnerable, and marginalized sections of the population-- from the preservation of fundamental rights to the maintenance of law and order and onward to the demonstration of transparency and accountability in everyday functions.The issues being raised are by no means exhaustive and the debate can be endless. This book does not claim to provide answers to the current predicament. Instead, it is intended to provoke a discussion of where we have been and what can be done.

Author Bio

Sulaiman Shaukat Wasty was born in Lahore, Pakistan, on 10 February 1951. Following his early schooling in Lahore, Pakistan, Sulaiman received a B.Sc. ECON. (Honours) from the London School of Economics and Political Science, an M.A. from the Johns Hopkins University Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, and a Ph.D. from Cornell University, Sulaiman has accumulated more than 30 years of experience in international development, specializing in the evaluation of public sector management, governance, and institutional development--spanning a career and assignments with the Planning Commission of Pakistan, the World Bank, and the United Nations. He is currently the president of Sharakpur, a Washington, DC-based consulting firm that provides advisory services to governments, corporations, and multilateral institutions in the conduct of their public policy mandates.He is also a founding member of Middle East and North Africa Consultants Association, and in 2012 was appointed team leader of a multidisciplinary United Nations (U.N.) group to carry out an independent assessment of the impact of the U.N. and other partners' ongoing reconstruction assistance to Iraq and its Kurdistan region. Further, Sulaiman is an advisor to Gulf State Analytics--a Washington, DC-based firm which assesses risks and opportunities among the Gulf countries in the Middle East Region.Sulaiman has been an adjunct scholar at the Middle East Institute; and has held guest teaching positions at the Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.He lives in Washington, DC.