New Appearance of Social Services Within the Scope of a New Public Administration Approach

Introduction

With the influence of the welfare state, public administrations have steadily grown to fulfill the duties expected from them. The services offered by public administrations to provide better service to the citizens have increased and diversified. However, it has become increasingly difficult to meet the growing structure of public administrations with existing budgets. With the traditional understanding of public administration, the provision of public services has become difficult. Therefore, the understanding that the state should be downsized has started to come to the agenda. Especially in the 1980s, an understanding of providing a more flexible, effective, and efficient public service has emerged. The name of this new administration is the new public management approach. Parallel to the developments in the world, our country was also affected by this change. The traditional understanding of public administration has begun to be questioned. Factors such as total quality management, accountability, openness, participatory, effectiveness, and efficiency applied in private administration have become mandatory in public administration. Thus, as in the private sector, citizens will be more satisfied. By using fewer resources, more output will be achieved, saving both times, resources and personnel.

In traditional public administration, services were carried out by the central government. In the new public administration approach, it is emphasized that services are carried out with the joint action of local government units, the private sector, non-governmental organizations, and state actors. In the provision of public services, more democratic and technology-intensive service delivery has come to the fore in line with the preferences and requests of the citizens.

With the change in technology, the needs of citizens have both increased and diversified with the change of socio-economic and cultural structure. As such, effective solutions could not be brought to the increasing demands of the citizens, and the problems started to increase. It has now become apparent that the state should be downsized and the management techniques used in the private sector should be used in the provision of services of the public administration. In time, the strict bureaucratic and centralist understanding of the state gave way to a more flexible and participatory management approach. The name of this new management model has been the new public administration approach. This approach puts the citizen in focus and the understanding that expects everything from the state has been replaced by a more flexible and participatory management approach. Thus, more effective and efficient service delivery will be realized with less cost. Social works are also affected by this change and transformation process. The traditional service provider has changed in the provision of social works. State actor plays the most important role in the provision of social works; with the transition to the new public administration approach, the state has taken a secondary position. The state's influence in the provision of social works has been reduced. Especially in recent restructuring efforts, it is seen that the influence of the state has been reduced. Giving more authority to local government units in the provision of social works has come to the fore. The need to keep the dispersed social works under a single roof has shown its effect in the reforms made.