lieving the Social Security Administration of the problems
of administering Social Security benefits for beneficiaries
living abroad ( Flemming v. Nestor, 363 U.S. 603 [ 1960]).Though a law is invalid as an ex post facto provision if
it concerns acts committed prior to its enactment, it is
valid when applied to subsequent offenses ( Jaehne v. New
York, 128 U.S. 189, 190 [ 1988]). Similarly, a law that criminalizes the continuation of conduct begun lawfully before
the act's passage is not ex post facto. However, contrary to
Ex parte Garland, the right to practice a profession may be
withheld retrospectively for a person convicted of an offense who was innocent before the statute was enacted, if
the offense may reasonably be considered as a basic disqualification for the profession ( Hawker v. New York, 170
U.S., 189, 190 [ 1898]).GEORGE DORIAN WENDEL
The major recommendation to address these deficiencies
was for the establishment of semiautonomous agencies to
carry out the executive functions of government. Agencies
were to be given well-defined frameworks that set out the
policy, budget, specific targets, and extent of the delegated
authority of the agency's management. Strategic control
was to remain with ministers, but once the policy and
frameworks were set, the management of the agency would
have as much independence as possible in deciding how
those objectives were to be met. After accepting the principles of the report, the UK government began the process
of executive agency creation throughout central government. Government targets are that some 450,000 civil servants from a total of 570,000 will be employed in agencies
by the late 1990s.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Corwin, Edward S., ed., 1953. The Constitution of the United States; Analysis and Interpretation. Washington, DC: Legislative Reference Service, Library of Congress; Government Printing Office.
Pritchett, C. Herman, 1959. The American Constitution. 2d ed. New York: McGraw-Hill.
EXECUTIVE AGENCY POLICY. A United Kingdom ( UK) decentralization policy involving the transfer of executive functions previously conducted by a central government department to a semiautonomous agency, headed by a chief executive, operating within a policy and resource framework set by that government department. Executive agency creation represents a shift from hierarchical to quasi-contractual administrative arrangements.
Origins and Subsequent History
Since 1979, the UK government has implemented fundamental reforms of central government departments
through the introduction of budgetary delegation and private sector management practices. An early attempt to inject individual managerial accountability was the 1982
Financial Management Initiative (FMI), which assumed
scope for substantial efficiency improvements through devolution of financial and management responsibility in the
Civil Service. Under FMI, decentralization was achieved in
three ways: creation of a "top management" system to provide senior officials with information on the scope and
scale of departmental operations and resource allocation;
delegated budgetary control through a hierarchy of "cost
centers"; and the introduction of performance indicators
and appraisals to monitor departmental and individual
performance. The success of this initiative was a precursor
to more radical policy reform leading to executive agency
creation.The major driver for executive agency policy was the 1988 UK report entitled "Improving Management in Government: The Next Steps" (Efficiency Unit 1988). Although the report indicated that earlier reforms had increased cost consciousness and improved management
systems in the Civil Service, it also pointed to residual obstacles to progress:| • | insufficient focus on the delivery of government services (as opposed to policy and ministerial support), even though 95 percent of civil servants worked in service delivery or executive functions; |
| • | a shortage of management skills and of experience of working in service delivery functions among senior civil servants; |
| • | that short-term political priorities tended to squeeze out long-term planning; |
| • | that there was too much emphasis on spending money, and not enough on getting results; |
| • | that the Civil Service was too big and too diverse to manage as a single organization. |
Underlying Theoretical Framework
The anticipated benefits underpinning UK executive policy can be summarized as follows:| • | Gains from separating public policy and service delivery functions. Executive agencies have been justified. on the grounds of divorcing policy formulation and implementation. On one hand, agencies provide a mechanism to free senior civil servants and ministers from the mundane activities of routine administration. On the other hand, agency policy facilitates the release of managers in the new organizations to pursue |
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