000			01968pab a2200205 454500
008			180718b2001 xxu||||| |||| 00| 0 eng d
100			_aBerman, Bruce J.
245			_aAfrican states, bureaucratic culture and computer fixes
260			_c2001
300			_ap.1-13
362			_aFeb
520			_aOur central argument in this article is that the introduction of computers in African states fails to produce the intended results. This is precisely because the trajectory of development of bureaucratic institutions in Africa has resulted in internal and external contexts that differ fundamentally from those of the Western states within which computing and information technology has been developed. This article explores the context in which computers were developed in Western industrialized societies to understand the circumstances that the technologies were designed to respond to and the bureaucratic culture that helped produce desired results. We then proceed to analyse the truncated nature of institution building in the colonial state, and how it structured the peculiar setting of the post-colonial African state and dynamics surrounding the integration of the new information and communication technologies. We argue that the colonial state bequeathed to its post-colonial successor three crucial characteristics that are of central importance to understanding why the introduction of computers does not produce anticipated improvements in public administration. These are the very limited technical capabilities of the bureaucracy; authoritarian decision-making processes under the control of generalist administrators; and the predominance of patron-client relationships. - Reproduced
650			_aCivil service - Africa
650			_aComputer - Africa
650			_aPublic administration - Africa
650			_aPublic administration
700			_aTettey, Wisdom J.
773			_aPublic Administration and Development
909			_a49182
999			_c49182 _d49182