01/12/2021 - 02/12/2021
The Venice Commission organised the 14th UniDem Med Seminar entitled "Good governance and quality of public administration", in co-operation with the Ministry of Digital Transition and Administrative Reform of the Kingdom of Morocco. This seminar took place in the form of a videoconference on 1-2 December 2021.
More than 100 international experts and senior public officials from the Southern Mediterranean (Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Palestine* and Tunisia) attended the event. On the basis of presentations by international and regional experts, participants exchanged and shared experiences on four sub-themes:
- Flexible, ethical and inclusive human resources management to improve performance and well-being at work in public administration;
- Ethics and codes of conduct in the public service: tools to strengthen citizens' trust;
- The right of access to information: towards a more open and transparent administration;
- A quality public service at the service of citizens: quality charters as a tool for good governance.
The presentations of the international and southern Mediterranean experts are available in English or French below.
This seminar was also an opportunity to present the standards and work of the Council of Europe in this field, such as the Council of Europe Convention on Access to Official Documents (CETS No. 205), also known as the Tromsø Convention, Recommendation 2000 (10) of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe on codes of conduct for public officials, the Guide on Public Ethics of the European Committee on Democracy and Governance (2019) or the Toolkit on Human Resource Management of the Centre of Expertise for Good Governance (2012).
The working languages of the seminar were English, French and Arabic.
The objective of the UniDem Med project (University for Democracy for the Southern Mediterranean) is to contribute through peer-to-peer exchanges to the modernisation of the public administrations in the region by ensuring the effective application of the law and the consolidation of institutions. The project aims to strengthen the legal capacities of senior civil servants in areas related to good governance, rule of law and human rights as well as to build closer ties between the public administrations from the region.
The UniDem Med project is co-funded by the European Union and the Council of Europe and implemented by the Council of Europe in the framework of the Joint Programme “Regional Support to Reinforce Human rights, Rule of Law and Democracy in the Southern Mediterranean" (South Programme IV).
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* This designation shall not be construed as recognition of a State of Palestine and is without prejudice to the individual positions of Council of Europe and European Union member States on this issue.