Applicability of public sector reform initiatives of the Yemeni government from the integrated TOE-DOI framework

Abstract

Effective resource allocation and accountability are critical for public services in countries facing a crisis, to ensure minimum inequality and even save lives. Administrative innovation is introduced as public sector reform to improve the performance and accountability of public sector organizations. Despite the said benefit, little has been done to study public administrative innovation in countries under crisis. This study extends the literature by examining the attitude of civil service managers to the administrative innovation in the Yemeni government representing a country in crisis from an integrated perspective of technology-organization-environment (TOE) and diffusion of innovation (DOI) theory. Data was collected from a survey of 200 civil service managers of the Yemeni central government. The result shows that the attitude of managers to private sector management style is scored the highest representing the key tool of the public administrative innovation. On the other hand, the downsizing elements were ranked the least significant as public sector reform elements. The explanatory model highlights the use of information technology, quality of human resources, and budget management orientation as significant factors for the applicability of public administrative innovation in the Yemeni central government.