AMBIENTE

By 2001 Howard had already been recognised as a successful politician, having led the coalition government to electoral success in 1996 and 1998. Howard’s successes in government stemmed from his promotion of the needs of Australians, particularly as they related to economic policy and security. Such policy was crucial to Australia as it adapted to changing conditions in the world. Howard also sought to continue to represent the Liberal tradition, which tended to focus on economic liberalism and social conservatism (Howard 2010, p. 234). In this success one can see the importance of Howard’s organisational capacity and his political skill. One can also trace the development of these skills back to one of Howard’s first experiences in politics, namely, his election in 1962 as the Young Liberal representative on the state executive of the New South Wales division of the Liberal Party. This involvement in genuine politics formed the beginning of a lifetime spent learning, amongst other things, how to construct and operate successfully within those organisational structures in which a life-long political career must be forged (Howard 2010, p. 30).

One of Howard’s key opportunities to demonstrate his capacity for organisational design came in his earliest years as Prime Minister. Interestingly, one of the key areas

that Howard focused upon was that related to foreign and defence policy. Before 9/11 occurred Howard was already intent upon improving the management of government power in that field. He sought to streamline the operation of decision-making authority putting greater emphasis on his role as an individual leader. To do this, Howard made a number of changes to the organisation of government, particularly as it related security policy. Howard effectively dominated the Cabinet and National Security Committee (NSC) of Cabinet organisation to a much larger extent than had his predecessors. Full Cabinet became Howard’s optional decision tool and decided most trade issues. Howard in the 1996 election campaign chose to broaden the NSC to consider all matters relating to defence, foreign affairs, and intelligence.

Howard moved to take full control over a parliament that in Australia has little say in foreign policy. Parliament gathers information and scrutinises government performance regarding foreign policy through question time and parliamentary committees (Firth 2005, p. 81). Party discipline ensures that Cabinet, rather than parliament, has decision-making power. Foreign policy is controlled by the executive government of Australia; the prime minister and foreign minister make decisions almost single-handedly, without the assistance of parliament. Howard’s own foreign policy power was harnessed through the NSC, which is composed of senior ministers, an armed force commander, one of the intelligence chiefs and optional expert advisors (Firth 2005, p. 80). These changes enhanced the Prime Minister’s authority over every function of leadership. According to Firth (2005, p. 86):

Parliament might inquire and report, but the executive decides. Parliament involves the public in its foreign policy inquiries, governments answer foreign policy questions in Question Time, and the hearings of the Senate Estimates Committee on the operations of DFAT make governments marginally more accountable.

Another important step taken by Howard was the enhancement of the power of the Prime Minister through the expansion of the role played by the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet (PMC). By putting the Prime Minister’s Department in charge of the Executive and Cabinet processes Howard revolutionised his ability as leader to

govern the organisational structures of government from the top down. Howard had given himself full controls as leader of the governmental foreign policy cluster that includes the role of bureaucracy, which has become more politicised since the Menzies government. The federal public service experienced a managerial revolution through which public servants became judged by their performance and the expectations of taskmasters in government. As a result, since Menzies’ time the public service has no longer been neutral. The senior ministerial advisors are appointed for political reasons; they are increasingly influential and rank alongside ministers and departmental secretaries. DFAT, which is usually usurped by ministerial power, came into existence in 1987, incorporating the old Department of Trade and Department of Foreign Affairs (Firth 2005, p. 78).

The structure of the Australian governmental input has evolved due to circumstances, responding to domestic and external challenges. Howard emphasised taking direct control of the means of policymaking. DFAT, which consists of 14 divisions and offices, illustrates the changing influence of economics in Australia’s foreign affairs and is the home base of diplomats and diplomatic missions for Australia (Firth 2005, p. 78). Influential bureaucratic decision-makers include the Prime Minister, Cabinet, and the Departments of Defence, Treasury and Immigration and Multicultural Affairs. The growth of the bureaucracy is partly a result of globalisation. As Jenning (2005, p. 19) has argued, bureaucratic complexity led to a number of problems in terms of the operation of Australia’s security policy, which:

…was the product of powerful bureaucratic departments, each closely guarding their sectional interests. Where issues crossed bureaucratic boundaries, interdepartmental committees would broker often uneasy compromises. The result of this was policies that often paid closer attention to the interests of departments than in producing a seamless response across the whole of government.

In order to effectively manage this increasingly complex structure, Howard strengthened the roles played by the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C) and the NSC. In addition, the Strategic Policy Coordination Group was responsible for coordination involving DFAT, Defence and the PM&C. The independent research centre Australian Strategic Policy Institute, founded in 2002, has added to the bureaucracy by

increasing the number of policy process inputs outside of the defence force and public service (Firth 2005, p. 80). Howard prevailed over the NSC and Expenditure Review Committee of Cabinet (Budgeting) that influenced Cabinet decisions. Constitutional flexibility allowed Howard as executive leader to take centralised control over the bureaucracy by using a few chief bureaucrats and advisors. As well as enhancing Howard’s control over foreign policy decisions, this also helped to prevent US-like departmental rivalry or turf wars that might have hampered the exercise of power.

Howard’s increasing exploitation of Executive power in 1996 substantially reformed the bureaucracy. Bureaucracy followed leadership design, implementation, control and means. In 1996, Howard was the Head of Cabinet and its committees overseeing foreign policy and consequentially all national security. A 1996 National Commission of Audit recommended streamlining five controlling departments to three. Howard replaced Keating’s foreign policy reliance on Cabinet with himself. Howard understood that Keating’s earlier Cabinet system (1991–96) failed because of its narrow outlook on advisors and the sharpness of their image (Shanahan 2006, p. 34). Howard’s 1996–2003 NSC was a thinned committee structure defined from the cabinet process by smaller groups of ministers who managed particular issues, often accompanied by officials and ministerial advisors (Gyngell & Wesley 2007, p. 94).

Howard’s desire to exercise responsible and effective control of Australia was strengthened by the work of the NSC. Here the professionalism of Howard’s political organisational capacity could be found. Howard himself has argued that the quality of his organisation of the NSC, in particular stating that, in his experience, Australia’s ‘NSC worked better than the comparable arrangement in either the United States or Britain’ (Author interview Howard, 2010). He was particularly critical of the fragmentation of the American system which, he said, ‘didn’t deliver in Washington… [W]e [Australians] always spoke with a single voice on these issues. And I think [the NSC is] a model that others can follow’ (Author interview Howard, 2010).

One of the common themes in Howard’s organisational changes was that he sought to work using a small group of others in the process of decision-making. The rationale behind assisting the Westminster style executive decision-making with an NSC, and Howard’s authority over it, was to make government more focused in its responses to foreign policy challenges. Howard tried to explain his role in the NSC during our interview, he moved very quickly, almost seamlessly, from the ‘field’ to the ‘participant’, from ‘the Prime Minister’ in one sentence to ‘we had everybody there’ in the next:

Yeah, you have a deep thing like that. But the Prime Minister is meant to be front and centre of it. But not, you know, not to the exclusion of others. But that’s where the NSC [National Security Committee of Cabinet] works so well because we had everybody there when all the major decisions were taken and that was very effective. (Author interview Howard, 2010)

It is clear that Howard never doubted his own capacity for producing successful organisational structures.