Tariq Mahmood Awan
Punjab’s civil bureaucracy is dominated by a “generalist” cadre of officers who rotate through different departments under the Services and General Administration Department (S&GAD). Posts such as departmental secretaries and others in agriculture, health, education, and other departments are routinely filled by members of the Pakistan Administrative Service (PAS) or the Provincial Management Service (PMS) – career bureaucrats with broad, generalist training rather than specialized expertise. This arrangement is a holdover from colonial governance and is increasingly out of place today. It arguably even contradicts Pakistan’s post-18th Amendment constitutional framework, which grants provinces autonomy over their own administrative affairs. How can one department (S&GAD) unilaterally reserve key positions in all other departments without specific legislative sanction? The result of this centralized, generalized bureaucracy is a misalignment of skills and mandates that hampers effective governance. Many experts now argue that Punjab (and Pakistan at large) should replace the colonial-era generalist system with specialized cadres for each sector. In other words, agriculture should be administered by agricultural management professionals, health by health services administrators, education by education managers, and so on. Specialized human resources are critical for improving governance and service delivery, and legal and administrative reforms are needed to facilitate this shift.
Colonial Legacy vs Modern Needs: The generalist bureaucracy in Pakistan is rooted in the British colonial civil service, which trained officers to be jack-of-all-trades administrators for a colonial state. That 19th-century model valued broad administrative control over technical know-how. Decades after independence, Pakistan still clings to this legacy: the elite PAS (formerly CSP) and provincial PMS consider themselves capable of managing any area of government. In the early decades, this unified cadre had its uses, but as the state’s responsibilities have expanded, its shortcomings have become stark. We live in an era of specialized knowledge – public health, information technology, agricultural science, and more – where effective administration requires subject-matter expertise. A one-size-fits-all bureaucracy cannot competently handle such diverse and complex needs. Yet Punjab’s governance structure has changed little: a Deputy Commissioner or Department Secretary today often has no background in the field they oversee. This mismatch leads to policies and decisions that are frequently out of touch with technical realities. Specialists within the government (engineers, doctors, agronomists, educators) remain confined to subordinate roles, while generalists occupy the leadership positions. The result is a serious capacity gap: the bureaucracy’s skill set is increasingly obsolete in a world that demands professionalism and expertise.
Constitutional and Legal Perspective: The continued imposition of a generalist cadre across all departments is not only administratively problematic but also of questionable legality under the devolved constitutional setup. After the 18th Amendment, provincial governments have full legislative and executive authority over subjects not in the federal list. Article 142(c) of the Constitution gives provinces exclusive power to legislate on matters in their domain, which logically includes the organization of provincial civil services. In principle, Punjab should design its bureaucracy through laws tailored to departmental needs. Instead, the province relies on the Punjab Government Rules of Business, 2011 – an executive instrument – through which S&GAD centralizes control of appointments. Under these rules (and longstanding practice), S&GAD treats many key posts in line departments as part of a common pool to be filled by PAS or PMS officers. Notably, even federal PAS officers continue to occupy top provincial posts under an old arrangement, despite no explicit law after devolution permitting this. This situation undermines provincial autonomy. Reserving provincial departmental posts for a federal service or for a generalist cadre by executive fiat finds little support in the post-2010 constitutional scheme. It would be more consistent with the law for the Punjab Assembly to enact a framework creating specialized departmental services, rather than allowing an administrative department (S&GAD) to override the legislature’s prerogative in staffing matters. In short, aligning the civil service with the spirit of the constitution means localizing and specializing provincial administration through proper legislation.
Governance Costs of Generalism: The drawbacks of an overly generalist bureaucracy are evident in daily governance. Generalist officers, however capable, lack the deep knowledge needed to make informed decisions in technical fields. A Secretary of Agriculture with no background in agriculture may miss nuances in crop diseases or irrigation policy; a Health Secretary unfamiliar with medicine may not fully grasp public health challenges. Frequent rotations compound the problem – by the time a generalist learns the basics of a department, he or she is transferred, and a new learning curve begins. This constant churn prevents continuity and long-term planning. Moreover, when generalists monopolize senior roles, the true experts in the department have limited influence. Professional staff – the agricultural scientists, doctors, teachers and engineers in government – often find their advice diluted or ignored if it conflicts with a generalist administrator’s outlook. This dynamic breeds frustration and inefficiency. Talented specialists see little chance to rise to leadership, which demotivates them and can lead to brain-drain from the public sector. Policies made without sufficient technical input tend to be ineffective or unsustainable, and public services suffer as a result. A generalist cadre trying to manage highly specialized sectors inevitably produces suboptimal outcomes – the bureaucracy stays busy with procedures but remains weak in solving substantive problems.
The Case for Specialized Cadres: Presently, the departments in Punjab have a dual setback. For example, the secretary of a health department is a general administrator, but does not have specialized medical skills. Then, the technical human resource, such as the director general of health, is a doctor but not a health administrator. Thus, both of them have capacity issues and are unable to inspire the department. Therefore, establishing specialized cadres for each major department can address these issues and improve governance. The idea is to recruit and train civil servants in particular fields so that, over their careers, they become both administrators and subject experts. For example, Punjab could have a dedicated Agriculture Management Service whose officers are educated in agriculture or related sciences and then groomed in public administration. Such officers would spend their careers in agriculture-related assignments – from local offices up to the Secretariat – gaining practical knowledge along with managerial experience. By the time one of them becomes Secretary of Agriculture, they would intimately understand farming issues, market dynamics, and the department’s operations. Decisions would likely be more informed, innovative, and responsive to stakeholders (farmers, agribusinesses, researchers, etc.). Similarly, a Health Service cadre composed of health professionals turned administrators would be better equipped to run hospitals and health programs than a generic bureaucrat parachuted into the role. Specialized cadres also create a clear career path for technical talent – an engineer or doctor joining the civil service could actually aim to lead their department one day, rather than hitting a glass ceiling under generalist bosses. This would attract and retain qualified professionals in government. Overall, specialization ensures the right people are in the right jobs, leading to more effective policy implementation and better service delivery. It also introduces greater accountability, since a specialized officer’s performance can be tied to sector-specific outcomes (like crop yields or disease control) rather than just generic administrative targets.
Implementing Reform – A Framework: Transitioning to specialized cadres will require both legal enactments and administrative changes. On the legal side, the Punjab Assembly should pass laws creating provincial departments and services for key sectors (agriculture, health, education, etc.) and assign each department’s top posts to its respective service. This would formally remove those positions from S&GAD’s general pool and anchor them in specialized cadres by law. If the Punjab Assembly and Government assume direct responsibility for recruitment and promotions, each specialized service would be organized through tailored mechanisms—for instance, sector-specific examinations conducted by the Punjab Public Service Commission—while the S&GAD’s role would be confined to setting broad civil service policy frameworks instead of exercising control over departmental postings. A phased transition can ensure that existing officers have time to adjust or acquire relevant training, so the new system takes over without disrupting ongoing work. With a clear legal framework and political will, the colonial generalist model can gradually be transformed into a set of professional, specialized bureaucracies.
Good governance in Punjab – and in Pakistan as a whole – requires moving beyond the colonial legacy of a generalist bureaucracy. The services like PAS, PMS, and PSP should not exist as general cadres and must be replaced with specialized administrative cadres for their federal, provincial, and local domains. Health Administrative Service, Education Administrative Service, Law and Order service and other specialized administrative services may be legislated by the Punjab Assembly for autonomous departments. The challenges facing today’s government are complex and sector-specific, and they demand correspondingly specialized knowledge and management. The continued retention of centralized general cadres—such as PAS, PSP, PMS, and similar services—across federal, provincial, and district tiers, and their extension over all departments and agencies, is unconstitutional, legally untenable, and inconsistent with the principle of specialized functionality. In contrast, creating specialized departmental cadres of administration and technical skills would align with the constitutional devolution of power, enhance administrative competence, and improve public service delivery. Punjab can take the lead by implementing these reforms and demonstrating how shifting from generalists to specialists strengthens governance, showing the way for other provinces and even the federal government to follow. Replacing the generalist cadre with specialized services strikes at the heart of an entrenched bureaucratic culture, but it is necessary if we hope to build a more efficient, responsive state. A specialized bureaucracy is an investment in better governance that Pakistan can no longer afford to postpone. Lastly, the Punjab assembly and legislators may need to come forward, and create departemnts and their specialized services through acts of assembly as per the constitutional requirement rather than allowing the political and permanent executive to create departmetns and services through rules without legislation.
