News

U.P. Centennial to Launch RUNNING A BUREAUCRACY

QUEZON CITY—Running A Bureaucracy—the first, groundbreaking guidebook for local government administrators, all public managers, and elected officials will soon be released. It will officially be launched on April 17, 2007 at the University of the Philippines’ National College of Public Administration and Governance (UP-NCPAG).

This has been confirmed by the book’s author, Ma. Gladys Cruz-Sta. Rita—considered to date as the country’s longest serving provincial administrator, who for 17 years has helped the Province of Bulacan reach its premiere status as leading public service innovator and good governance model of the country.

Dr. Alex B. Brillantes, Jr. , professor and dean of UP-NCPAG is strongly endorsing Running A Bureaucracy to public administration practitioners and scholars. “Good governance and new public management advocates, including the NCPAG recognized its potential to be the definitive guidebook, not only for LGU administrators, but for all public managers and officials who would want to make a difference for their country” he said.

The UP-NCPAG, which is celebrating the grand 100th founding year of the University of the Philippines, is releasing Sta. Rita’s book as one of its Centennial Publications.

Running A Bureaucracy is already a most anticipated book even by national government personalities, local government officials and private sector leaders of the country. Among the most prominent endorsers of the book are Senator Francis Pangilinan, former city councilor and staunch local autonomy advocate, Senator Aquilino Pimentel, considered the father of the Local Government Code, Former Senator Joey Lina, Director Maribel Sacendoncillo of the Local Government Academy, League of Municipalities Executive Director Li-Ann De Leon, and Vice Chairman Roman Felipe Reyes of audit consulting giant SyCip, Gorres, Velayo and Co.

Reyes considers the pathbreaking book as a “welcome surprise and great find for the corporate executive in search of a reliable roadmap to the local government bureaucracy.” “The book explores how the private and public sectors are continually bridging and sharing new management technologies,” said the SGV executive.

After a series of consultations during the last quarter of 2007, Running A Bureaucracy has steadily garnered support from public managers’ organizations, LGU leagues and the academe from all over the country.

“This book is the first of its kind and the ultimate guide to the new paradigm of local government administration; one that reinvents the role of public managers in making good governance work for the bureaucracy,” explains Provincial Administrators’ League of the Philippines (PALP) president, Virgilio Esguerra. The league has recently expressed their support for the book, touting it as the “must-read” for today’s new Filipino public manager and even for elected public officials on the look-out for new management techniques and approaches.

Sta. Rita, for almost 2 decades served under 2 of the most multi-awarded and respected post-People Power governors of the country—former Governor Roberto “Obet” Pagdanganan and former Governor Josefina “Josie” Dela Cruz. She continues to serve the same position under Bulacan’s newly-elected chief executive, Joselito R. Mendoza. During their respective administrations, Bulacan had received numerous accolades and awards for local governance innovations and breakthroughs.

“It would not be wrong at all to partly attribute Bulacan’s prominence to the author’s own exemplary management of premiere development programs that had elevated the provincial government to the halls of fame as a reinvented, citizen-responsive bureaucracy,” said Brillantes. The book, Running A Bureaucracy, he said, faithfully details how the country’s public managers, as well as public officials could replicate the Bulacan experience and the author’s sterling public service carreer.