Universities and the Training of Local Officials

Abstract

The article analyzes the training provided to civil servants by different types of institutions, indicating that the universities have the potential to become important actors in this field. In a disorganized market of training programs for civil servants and elected officials, in which the competences of the actors involved are unclear and the standards for training programs are decided by different providers, the capitalization of the universities’ potential of providing training programs for the public sector is currently at a low level. Universities ought to abandon the existent approach based only on the current needs of the administrative domain. They have to anticipate and even to determine tendencies or directions of evolution and to offer appropriate programs to administrative institutions. They have to move beyond the frame of traditional disciplines and adapt to permanent social changes (through educational programs with an interdisciplinary character in fields that are imposed by the major issues of public administration).