State reform

State reform is a dirty word that can mean a lot of things. Basically, whatever we want it to mean. Most of the time, it is confused with technological innovation, as if it were limited to the introduction of Artificial Intelligence in the public sector. This is a mistake that was made in the past when the use of the internet became common. Reforming the state is not about modernizing its functioning. It is much more than that.

From a technocratic perspective, it will be to make it more efficient. But from a political perspective, it does not stop there. Firstly, it aims to ensure that the state does not jeopardize individual freedoms. Secondly, it aims to ensure that these individual freedoms are not jeopardized by others.

A reform of the state that has these two objectives in mind begins by listing its essential functions. Security, defence, external representation and justice are usually at the top of the list of priorities. But what about health? And education? The state's objective should be to ensure that these are equally accessible to all. But how is this to be achieved? Through direct action by the state, by political power, solely through public hospitals and schools? Or should the state be responsible for establishing objectives and regulating the activities that society will undertake with a view to this same end? The same question applies to mobility: should the state have the responsibility for having planes, buses and trains or should it simply (and this is no small feat) ensure that the infrastructures are built, that they coincide with the previously defined objectives of territorial cohesion and that they are maintained in accordance with pre-established rules?

Once this first point of discussion has been overcome, the State withdraws from certain areas, readjusts its actions in others and increases its care and investment in those that we consider to be key. As an example, in the justice system. Portuguese courts take time to judge, essentially for two reasons. First, due to the Portuguese model of guarantees. The priority of the Portuguese judicial system is to ensure that the rights of defendants and accused persons are respected. They are citizens and when we talk about defending citizenship rights we also have to talk about defendants and accused persons, if only because any of us can be a defendant or accused in a case. It is not necessary to have breached a contract or committed a crime. All that is needed is to submit a request to that effect or an accusation in court. The rights of defendants and accused persons exist precisely for this reason: to provide security against the discretion of who can be a defendant and accused without there being any reason for it. This is a model that partly explains the time it takes for the courts to decide and, for the reasons mentioned, should not be questioned. However, there is another explanation for the delays in the justice system that can be answered. That is, the judicial system is the same as it was in the 1970s and 1980s, when legal litigation was much smaller than it is today.

Therefore, since justice is one of the essential functions of the state, in a reform that is carried out with both feet and head, the attention and investment that the state fails to make in certain sectors should be channelled towards justice. With more resources, one of the measures involves better training for judicial officials, which in turn implies paying them better salaries. Proper (and longer) training for judicial officials will be the only way for them to be competent to take on judicial acts that do not have to be carried out by judges who must concentrate on legally more complex cases. Cases that cannot be decided overnight. That require work, study and consideration. It is therefore crucial that a judge is not overwhelmed with legally simple cases that can be dealt with by judges with less experience or court officials who are duly qualified to do so.

But it is not just in the justice system. The state needs senior and mid-level civil servants in their areas of activity. Hence the need to create a good training school for civil servants that equips them with knowledge that legitimizes them in the positions they will occupy in the state and that, in this way, allows them to be independent from political power. It is this technical independence that will be essential for the state to function even when there are elections. So that it does not stop every time there are elections. It is also this technical training that will allow civil servants to advance in their careers based on merit and not on party membership. It is this training that will make way for the separation between what is a technical decision and what is a political decision.

These examples I have mentioned imply that investments must be made. An increase in expenditure in certain areas of the state requires a reduction in expenditure in other areas of the state. That is why reforming the state is a complex issue and cannot be reduced to technicalities. It is a political choice. If Luís Montenegro's government really wants to reform the state, I hope it will not stop at technical aspects. I expect it to make policy. Reforming the state is a political issue that requires discussion and political decision-making, and that is how it should be viewed.