HORIZON EUROPE┋Government in transition – how governments change the way they work and prepare the civil service for the future

Expected Outcome

Projects should contribute to all of the following expected outcomes.

• Country government innovation info sheets, trends, inspiring good practices, the most innovative solutions recently developed or work in progress for next-generation governance and future-informed public decision making in EU Member States and Associated Countries (MS/AC).
• Policy recommendations for both EU level and MS/AC level actions on adopting new governance paradigms, and strategies for enhanced (technical and financial) support for internal government innovation efforts.
• Publication of lessons learned to enlighten government officials and the public about the often-invisible internal innovation strategies and impactful solutions in national governments.
• A comprehensive MOOC (Massive Online Open Course) for government officials with relevant examples and cases.
• Fostering of closer ties and collaboration among MS/AC (and any other relevant actors) to leverage national capabilities in innovative governance and maintain peer learning through e.g. relevant networks and knowledge exchange platforms.

Scope

In an era characterized by numerous concurrent crises, accelerated technological development, and waning public trust in government, the pivotal objective of this topic is to furnish a precise depiction of the current condition of public service in MS/AC, highlight the substantial challenges governments are endeavouring to manage at the same time, the general state of the civil service and the evolution of related public employment management, including HR policy, the organizational framework conditions conducive to innovation and agile operations, and organizational development efforts. Enhancing government capacities to define strategies and develop complex public policies in a swiftly evolving context is imperative. Traditional methods are increasingly ineffective, necessitating a reinvention of government operations.

This investigation intends to shed light on the disruptions currently reshaping the work of governments, the complex tasks they are grappling with, their internal innovation efforts and change processes little known by the public, and to showcase the immense investment and good practices governments developed and are developing to deal with their core business in radically new ways. Governments take various paths that best suit their ambition, vision, leveraging power and the characteristics of their national context.

Proposals are expected to cover all three focus areas detailed below:

1. New governance paradigm: Focus on new governance approaches and reforms in response to declining public trust, from preparation for crisis to anticipatory governance, agile leadership, using an innovation portfolio approach to strategic planning, working with the innovation ecosystem in strategic decision-making, the impacts of digital technology (especially the role of AI, automation, the redefinition of tasks, related opportunities and threats,), open government approaches, democratic participation and central communication strategies, information flows (including social media), and related civil service development governments undertake to stand the ground today and to prepare for tomorrow.
2. Innovative approaches to public service and policy development: Solving complex issues needs multidisciplinary (including from SSH disciplines) and innovative approaches to high-quality public service and effective administrative delivery, policy- and decision making, such as citizen participation, stakeholder engagement, systems thinking, role of technology/AI and interconnected data systems and experimentation (i.e. evidence-informed policymaking).
3. New public employment management and civil service empowerment: Enabling governments to explore possibilities and transforming the civil service through innovation and public intrapreneurship, HR policy, including a public administration health-check, and capacity building (e.g. upskilling, reskilling, future literacy), the organizational framework conditions (also sensitive to the needs of the next generation of civil servants) conducive to innovation and building resilience, and cooperation with other EU governments (data exchange, mutual support) while building a modern, future-ready civil service.

While national governments in the EU and Associated Countries are the primary focus for this investigation, regional and local governments as well as documented, highly inspirational good practice cases from the global context are of interest to learn from.

This should give voice to the civil service, examining how civil service officials (in various roles, functions and level of decision making, and in their diversity, including gender, age, socio-economic background, experience level, and other relevant personal characteristics) see the changing role of the state, their own role, organizational framework conditions (i.e. people, knowledge, ways of working, and rules and processes), how they cope under the current pressures, and what their visions, hopes and needs are for the future.

The research should build on existing work (data, reports, case studies, networks) by EU institutions, international organizations (World Economic Forum, OECD, United Nations, Chandler Institute of Governance, etc.), schools of governance, national governments and innovation agencies in EU Member States and Associated Countries, complemented by primary data to be collected through large-scale surveying, in-depth interviews, strategic reflection workshops covering key issues in the public governance domain (e.g. the core tasks of government, internal innovation strategies, regaining citizens’ trust, etc.), and key stakeholder engagement. The proposals should elaborate on the planned collection and analysis of the primary data (beyond desk research), and on the proposed engagement with senior officials in national government, at European level and international organizations (as relevant), demonstrating deep reach into the national civil services as key factors for the successful delivery of the work.

Proposals are encouraged to take stock of the uptake of provisions of Commission Communication COM(2023) 667[1], and seek complementarity with relevant EU-funded projects, the OECD Observatory of Public Sector Innovation, and the relevant work of the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission.

[1] https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A52023DC0667