Political Settlements and Bureaucratic Reforms: An Exploratory Analysis Focusing on Bangladesh

Abstract

This article attempts to analyse contemporary reforms of public bureaucracy in Bangladesh from the perspective of ‘political settlements’. After elaborating the concept of political settlement and identifying critical reform initiatives in the public bureaucracy, it argues that variations in the state of the implementation of bureaucratic reforms are decidedly affected by the differences in the pattern of political settlements that the nation has experienced at various times since independence. Thus, in the process of consolidating dominant power coalitions, reform measures were subverted, and formal and informal privileges given to the public bureaucracy resulted in inefficient, ineffective and unaccountable administration.