This document summarizes the history and current practices of government performance management and evaluation in South Korea. It discusses how the Korean system was initially influenced by models from the United States but developed distinct features due to Korea's institutional and cultural context. The key features of the Korean system include an emphasis on centralization, hierarchy, group harmony, and submission to authority. It also features the involvement of civilian committees in oversight and the use of advanced information technology. The document provides an overview of Korea's legal framework and the processes of self-evaluation and specific evaluation that are used to assess performance at the organizational level.

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Public Performance & Management Review
ISSN: 1530-9576 (Print) 1557-9271 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/mpmr20
Government Performance Management and
Evaluation in South Korea: History and Current
Practices
Seung-Bum Yang & Ador R. Torneo
To cite this article: Seung-Bum Yang & Ador R. Torneo (2016) Government Performance
Management and Evaluation in South Korea: History and Current Practices, Public
Performance & Management Review, 39:2, 279-296, DOI: 10.1080/15309576.2015.1108767
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2. Public Performance & Management Review, 39, 279–296, 2015
Copyright # Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
ISSN 1530-9576 (print), ISSN 1557-9271 (online)
DOI: 10.1080/15309576.2015.1108767
GOVERNMENT PERFORMANCE
MANAGEMENT AND EVALUATION
IN SOUTH KOREA: HISTORY AND
CURRENT PRACTICES
SEUNG-BUM YANG
Konkuk University
ADOR R. TORNEO
De La Salle University
ABSTRACT: This article discusses the history and features of South Korea’s
government performance management and evaluation system. The Korean
system was initially influenced by New Public Management and Reinventing
Government as practiced in the United States, but it has developed distinct
features that stem from South Korea’s institutional and cultural context. These
features reflect a blend of Western institutions and Korean cultural influences
that emphasize centralization, hierarchy, group harmony, and submission to
higher authority. The institutionalized representation and involvement of
civilians in the committee-type bodies that oversee performance evaluation at
all levels, and the adoption of a comprehensive and advanced information
technology platform, on the other hand, signify a desire to break from the past.
KEYWORDS: government performance, Korean government, performance
evaluation, performance management, self-evaluation, South Korea.
Performance management and evaluation systems have been widely adopted
and implemented by governments around the globe. The adoption of such
systems, which originated in the private sector, has become a significant aspect
of recent attempts to assess and improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and
accountability of government organizations in a number of countries (Bianchi
& Rivenbark, 2012; Bouckaert & Halligan, 2008; De Bruijn, 2007; Modell &
Grönlund, 2007; Norman, 2007; Ohemeng, 2011; Pollitt & Dan, 2013; Sterck
& Scheers, 2006). Following New Public Management (NPM) and Reinventing
Address correspondence to Seung-Bum Yang, 120 Neungdong-ro, Gwangjin-gu, Seoul 05029, South
Korea. E-mail: sbyang@konkuk.ac.kr
279
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3. Government (ReGo) trends in the United States, South Korea has also
incrementally developed a performance management system that features
performance measurement, performance budgeting, and related performance
management strategies and perspectives.
The core policy of South Korea’s government performance management
and evaluation system is embodied in the Framework Act on Government
Performance Evaluation (FAGPE) of 2006. This law, enacted with the purpose
of improving efficiency, effectiveness, and accountability, was largely inspired
by, and borrows features from, the U.S. Government Performance and Results
Act (GPRA) of 1993. Nevertheless, the Korean government performance
management and evaluation system has developed features that reflect the
particular context, characteristics, and needs of the Korean public sector.
This article provides an overview of South Korea’s government performance
management and evaluation system, its history, development, and features. The
discussion highlights distinct features of the Korean system vis-à-vis its U.S.
counterpart and discusses how the Korean institutional and cultural context
influenced their emergence. Finally, it provides an update to the most recent
developments, as well as the issues and challenges that have accompanied the
FAGPE law’s adoption and implementation.
The Korean setting is different from the United States in that it retains a
top-down hierarchical structure and is still influenced by a tradition of political
and administrative centralization rooted in history and re-emphasized during the
country’s relatively recent experience of authoritarianism from the 1960s to the
1980s. Korean politics and bureaucracy are also influenced by Confucian
values, which place primacy on harmony and the collective, and reinforce a
culture of submissiveness to authority. It also stands out for its extensive
development and adoption of information technology in many aspects of its
operations. The present article is intended to introduce readers to the case of
the Korean system and to foster a discussion of performance management as
adapted and practiced in non-Western contexts. In addition, it provides insights
on how Western principles and practices are adapted and operate in a different
cultural and institutional context. South Korea’s experiences with an NPM- and
ReGo-inspired system may be relevant to developing democracies planning to
establish their own performance management and evaluation systems after
passing through long periods of authoritarianism. This may also be relevant
to emerging democracies whose bureaucracies are still centralized, top-down
in structure, and influenced by a culture of hierarchy.
This article is descriptive in nature and adopts the case approach. It provides
a comparative angle to the extent that broad comparisons are made to
distinguish the Korean government’s performance management and evaluation
system from its U.S. counterpart. The article is based on a review of official
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4. government reports, documents, legislation, and research articles, particularly
official and nonofficial preliminary assessments by government officials and
Korean and Western scholars, where available.
Performance Management Evaluation in South Korea
Compared to the United States and other Western countries, South Korea has
had a relatively short history as a democracy and an even shorter history with
democratic and modern public administration. For centuries under the Joseon
dynasty, Korea was administered by a Confucian-influenced monarchical
system characterized by a highly centralized and aristocratic bureaucracy that
expected unquestioning submissiveness and loyalty from the masses. The
Confucian worldview valued hierarchy, harmony, and stability based on the
absolute authority of the governing elites. The values it inculcated included
dutiful submissiveness to political authority and acceptance of elitist decision-
making. These influences persist to this day despite economic development
and modernization (Kim, 1999).
In the early twentieth century, Korea was annexed and administered by the
Japanese colonial administration. The liberation and the division of the Korean
peninsula came at the end of World War II. The North established a communist
government under the influence of the Soviet Union, while the South sought to
establish a democratic government in the sphere of influence of the United
States and its allies. The American military administration adopted the Japanese
bureaucratic structure but made it more complex and centralized, even as it
introduced democracy. These efforts were interrupted by the outbreak of the
Korean War in 1950. The aftermath of the Korean War saw the establishment
of a heavily centralized Korean democratic government under American
auspices.
The roots of South Korea’s modern-day performance management and
evaluation system may be traced back to the Policy and Program Assessment
System (PPAS) of 1961 (Hur, 2013). Reflecting the country’s industrialization
and economic growth thrust, this system was established to assess the economic
efficiency of policies adopted as part of the country’s five-year economic devel-
opment plans. Under this system, the performance evaluation system was put
directly under the supervision of the prime minister’s Planning and Coordi-
nation Office. This system remained in place until 1981. In the 1980s, the PPAS
was transferred from the prime minister’s office to the Economic Planning
Board (EPB). In the 1990s, a two-track policy evaluation system was adopted.
One track focused on economic development and was managed by the EPB. The
other track focused on the evaluation of individual agencies’ key public policies
and was managed by the Office of the Prime Minister.
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5. More systematic efforts to measure performance were attempted in the
2000s. The Korean National Assembly enacted the Framework Act on
Government Performance Evaluation (FAGPE) of 2001 with the purpose of
improving government efficiency, effectiveness, and accountability. This devel-
opment was inspired by the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA)
of 1993 in the United States and influenced by NPM and ReGo concepts and
strategies. Under the law, agencies were required to identify one or two key
policy areas for which they would be evaluated.
The National Assembly enacted a new Framework Act on Government
Performance Evaluation (FAGPE) in 2006. This law outlined a more compre-
hensive system and covered both performance management and performance
evaluation of all government organizations. The law aimed to improve and inte-
grate the various performance evaluation programs and reduce the burden
resulting from redundancies in the evaluation process.
Prior to 2006, the performance management and evaluation systems of the
Korean government were dispersed and consisted of various programs adminis-
tered under different agencies. The FAGPE law of 2006 systematized and
integrated the various systems under the Government Performance Evaluation
Committee (GPEC).
Framework Act on Government Performance Evaluation
The FAGPE law of 2006 allowed for the establishment of an integrated and
comprehensive, government-wide performance management and evaluation
system. It paved way for two types of performance evaluation of central
government agencies: self-evaluation, and specific evaluation. It also introduced
performance evaluation of public enterprises, quasi-governmental organizations,
and local governments. In conjunction with the FAGPE law, the Korean perfor-
mance management and evaluation system, taken as a whole, also includes the
National Finance Act, the State Public Officials Act, and several other laws (see
Table 1).
In addition to providing rules for evaluating and increasing efficiency,
effectiveness, and accountability, the FAGPE law of 2006 aimed to
strengthen the competence of government organizations in conducting eva-
luations. The law explicitly outlined the government’s performance manage-
ment strategy and execution plans, which include the setting of annual and
mid- to long-term plans that incorporate the duties and strategic targets of
government bodies. In contrast to the 2001 law, it effectively linked perfor-
mance and budgets by requiring heads of agencies to take mid- to long-term
financial plans into account and by including each agency’s financial per-
formance for the past three years in its annual performance management
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6. execution plan and budgeting. Execution of agency plans is monitored and
checked biannually.
Performance Evaluation at the Organizational Level
The Korean central government currently implements several different evaluation
systems: self-evaluation, specific evaluation, or teukjung evaluation, of central
agencies, performance evaluation of quasi-governmental organizations and public
enterprises, and local government performance evaluation. Self-evaluation
focuses on an organization’s setting of performance responsibilities and targets
and subsequent evaluation of its own performance against these goals. Specific
evaluation systems are evaluations conducted to check whether individual central
government agencies are effectively executing key national policies. Performance
evaluation of quasi-governmental organizations and public enterprises is done on
the basis of leadership, management efficiency, and key business programs. Local
government evaluation focuses on key programs delegated to the local govern-
ments by the central government. The Government Performance Evaluation
Committee (GPEC), a multisectoral external evaluation agency, is the primary
government agency that oversees all of these evaluation systems.
Table 1. Legal Grounds for Korean Government Performance Management
System
Level
Management
technique Target Legal ground
Organization
level
Performance
measurement and
management
Government
organization
FAGPE
Program level Program Assessment
Rating Tool
Selected non-R&D
programs
FAGPE
National Finance Act
Program Assessment
Rating Tool (R&D)
Selected R&D
programs
FAGPE
Act on Performance
Evaluation and
Management of
National Research
and Development
Projects, etc.
Individual level Performance
agreement
Higher-level pubic
officials (Grades 1–4)
FAGPE
State Public Officials
Act
Job appraisal Mid- & lower- level
public officials
(Grades 5–9)
FAGPE
State Public Officials
Act
Note: FAGPE ¼ Framework Act on Government Performance Evaluation.
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7. SPECIFIC EVALUATION OF CENTRAL GOVERNMENT AGENCIES
The 2006 FAGPE law requires the heads of central government agencies to
establish mid- to long-term performance management strategic plans as well
as annual execution plans for performance management. The performance man-
agement strategic plans are aimed at meeting the strategic targets of the agency
and its affiliated organizations, and they are supposed to be revised at least once
every three years. The annual performance management execution plans, on the
other hand, include duties, strategic targets, annual performance targets, perfor-
mance indicators for the year, and the financial performance results for the past
three years. Indicators are to be created in the most objective and quantifiable
way possible. This is similar to the U.S. system.
Agencies receive annual performance guidelines from the GPEC in January
of every year. Each agency is expected to prepare and submit an annual perfor-
mance plan to the GPEC. The GPEC and the Prime Minister’s Office review the
plans and suggest revisions or refinements. The plans are then finalized by the
agencies. This is followed by the development of self-evaluation plans by the
agencies and of specific performance evaluation plans by the GPEC. Most agen-
cies are subject to annual specific evaluations focusing on the attainment of key
national policy goals.
To facilitate effective evaluation, the GPEC organizes and deploys evaluation
subcommittees composed of members and experts from universities, research
institutes, nongovernmental organizations, and officials from the Policy Analy-
sis and Evaluation Office. Evaluation has two phases: a mid-term evaluation,
which is conducted around June, and a final evaluation, conducted around
December of each year.
The prime minister, who co-chairs the GPEC, discusses the evaluation results
with the heads of agencies. The GPEC then reviews, consolidates, and presents
the reports to the cabinet at the end of the year. The feedback generated by this
evaluation is used for policy improvement, budgeting, and organizational and
personnel management. Performance evaluation results are used in determining
budget cuts or budget increases as determined by the Ministry of Strategy and
Finance (MSF). The prime minister is tasked with disclosing the evaluation
results through such media as the Internet. The involvement of the prime min-
ister differentiates the Korean system from its U.S. counterpart.
SELF-EVALUATION OF CENTRAL GOVERNMENT AGENCIES
Self-evaluation aims to strengthen the capacity of government agencies to con-
duct autonomous performance management and evaluations. The system
requires each individual agency to identify and select its own performance plan
and targets based on its long-term strategic plan. It then evaluates its own
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8. performance annually. The head of each central administrative agency is tasked
to set up and manage a self-evaluation team and a self-evaluation committee to
oversee the process. More than two thirds of the self-evaluation committee’s
members are civilians. The focus of self-evaluation includes policy processes,
financial performance, and administrative capacities.
In line with the performance plans they submit, the agencies are tasked to
prepare an annual self-evaluation plan and submit it to the GPEC by the end
of April each year. The GPEC may request that the agency supplement the plan
or submit related materials. The self-evaluation committees of each agency
conduct performance evaluations in the first half of July, followed by site visits
from August through November. By March of the following year, agency self-
evaluation committees report the results to the Prime Minister’s Office, which
can re-evaluate the agency if the self-evaluation is found to lack objectivity
and credibility. The report is then submitted to the GPEC for approval. The
self-evaluation system is similar to that established by the GPRA in the United
States.
The heads of administrative bodies required to conduct self-evaluations are
tasked with creating a plan in order to revise problematic policies and taking
voluntary corrective measures when the evaluations detect problems. The
head of each agency is assigned to analyze the evaluation results in the cate-
gories of organization, budgeting, personnel, and compensation. Agency
heads are also required to include the previous year’s evaluation results in
the budget request for the following year. The minister of strategy and finance
is expected to take account of central agencies’ evaluation results when draw-
ing up their budgets for the following year. This process is different from the
U.S. system.
EVALUATION OF LOCAL GOVERNMENTS
By law, the performance evaluation of local governments is also under the pur-
view of the GPEC. In practice, however, the administration of this system is
delegated to the Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs
(MOGAHA), which in turn reports the results to the GPEC. The MOGAHA
oversees the establishment of a joint evaluation committee to set performance
parameters and evaluate the performance of eight metropolitan cities and nine
provincial governments. The joint committee includes professionals both from
inside and outside the government. This committee evaluates the performance
of tasks and programs delegated by the central government to local governments
in various pre-identified areas. The evaluation committees of other central agen-
cies that have delegated other programs and functions to local governments are
allowed to conduct separate individual performance evaluations.
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9. EVALUATION OF PUBLIC ENTERPRISES AND QUASI-
GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS
As in the case of local governments, the GPEC is also officially the primary
agency in charge of evaluating the performance of public enterprises and quasi-
governmental organizations. In practice, however, its authority to conduct evalua-
tions in this area is delegated to the Ministry of Strategy and Finance (MSF). The
ministry organizes a steering committee and a separate evaluation board. The
steering committee is chaired by the strategy and finance minister and has 11
members, appointed for three years each, from the legal profession, the business
community, academia, and labor groups. It determines the performance evaluation
scheme. The evaluation board conducts the actual evaluations and is composed of
150 professionals specializing in evaluation of specific policy areas (Hur, 2013).
PERFORMANCE EVALUATION AT THE INDIVIDUAL LEVEL
The 2006 FAGPE law does not specifically cover individual-level performance
management and evaluation, and a detailed discussion of this system is beyond
the scope of the present article. Nevertheless, because the law effectively sets
and aligns the performance goals, standards, and indicators for all government
organizations, it is only logical that agencies establish systems that align
organizational goals with the performance goals of their officials and individual
employees. The performance agreement plays a critical role in providing this
link between organizational and individual performance. Individual perfor-
mance evaluation results, however, do not affect organizational budgets, unlike
organizational evaluation results, which are used to determine the budget of the
following fiscal year.
According to the Regulation on Civil Service Performance Evaluation, a
performance agreement is an agreement between evaluators and those evaluated
regarding performance goals, evaluation indicators, and the use of the evaluation
results. The process of formulating a performance agreement includes setting
goals of different levels. The agency head and deputy head set the strategic goals.
The goals for heads and deputy heads are organizational goals and focus on orga-
nizational outcomes. Bureau directors set performance goals that focus on orga-
nizational outputs. Section managers also set performance goals, but these goals
focus more on individual activities (Civil Service Commission of Korea, 2005).
Notable Features
DIRECT INVOLVEMENT OF TOP POLITICAL LEADERSHIP
In contrast to the U.S. system, where performance management and evaluation
are mainly supervised by an executive department in the Office of Management
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10. and Budget (OMB), Korea’s top political leadership takes a direct and
prominent role in the government’s performance management and evaluation
system. Since the 1960s, the Prime Minister’s Office has generally overseen
the implementation of the Korean government performance management
and evaluation system in its various incarnations. Although South Korea has
a presidential and not a parliamentary form of government, the prime minister
still holds substantial political authority. The prime minister has the right to
recommend ministerial candidates to the president. The historical subordination
of performance evaluation to the prime minister shows the direct involvement of
top political leadership in performance management.
At present, the prime minister still plays a powerful, albeit somewhat
reduced, role in managing the performance evaluation system. The prime min-
ister, as co-chair of the government performance management and evaluation
body in the GPEC, still leads the setting of evaluation methods, standards,
and indicators, but shares this role with a civilian co-chair. The prime minister
is also tasked to aggregate the performance evaluation reports, brief the cabinet,
and disseminate the information to the public. The head of each central agency,
on the other hand, is tasked to brief the standing committee within the National
Assembly on the results of the preceding year’s self-evaluation.
BROAD COVERAGE AND TOP-DOWN STRUCTURE
South Korea’s current government performance management and evaluation
system has very broad authority, as it supervises all central agencies, local
governments, and even public enterprises and quasi-governmental organizations.
All of these bodies are required to undergo similar processes of evaluation. Many
of their performance goals are set by the central government and cascaded down
to agencies, and even to the local governments that implement national policies,
despite the latter’s supposed autonomy. This is typical of the centralized and
top-down management style that characterizes much of the Korean public sector.
In contrast, the government performance and evaluation system in the United
States, established by the GPRA law of 1993 and its 2010 amendment, primarily
applies only to federal government agencies and programs. State governments
are not covered by GPRA and have plenty of autonomy and flexibility in adopting
their own performance goals and performance management and evaluation systems.
The U.S. federal government cannot simply order state governments to adopt its
mandated performance management systems. In South Korea, the reverse is true.
STRESS ON EVALUATION COMPONENT
South Korea’s current system provides a platform for both performance evalu-
ation and performance management. It is noteworthy, however, that a stronger
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11. emphasis is put on the evaluation component than the performance component.
Organizations (and individuals) are evaluated based on how well they
accomplish the goals and targets cascaded down from higher levels of govern-
ment. This is somewhat different from the U.S. system, which puts more empha-
sis on performance, and from other Western systems that emphasize capacity
and management accountability (Hur, 2013). These differences derive from
the different institutional contexts and cultures.
INSTITUTIONALIZED INVOLVEMENT OF CIVILIANS
In contrast to the United States, where the primary performance agency is the
Office of Management and Budget (OMB), an executive agency, the primary
institution of performance evaluation in the Korean system is the GPEC, a com-
mittee-type organization composed of government officials and civilian experts.
The prime minister and a civilian expert co-chair the GPEC. It has a maximum of
15 members, including three ministers supervising the evaluation and 10 civilian
experts. The GPEC is the primary institution that oversees the Korean govern-
ment’s performance evaluation system at all levels. Because it is a committee,
administrative support e for the GPEC is provided by self-evaluation committees
established by each agency and by the Policy Analysis and Evaluation Office.
The self-evaluation committee in charge of annual performance evaluation in
each agency consists of from 10 to 30 members, appointed by the head of the
agency, who usually serve two-year terms. More than two thirds of the self-
evaluation committee’s members must be civilian experts coming from acade-
mia, the nonprofit sector, and the mass media. The joint evaluation committee
that sets and administers the performance evaluation of local governments
includes professionals from inside and outside the government. Likewise, the
steering committees and evaluation boards that oversee and administer the
performance evaluations of quasi-governmental organizations and public
enterprises include very substantial numbers of civilian members who represent
relevant sectors and have fixed-term appointments (Hur, 2013).
CENTRAL ROLE OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
Another unique feature of the Korean performance management and evaluation
system, as compared to its U.S. counterpart, is the central role of information
technology. The FAGPE law of 2006 specifically refers to an “integrated
electronic evaluation system” and requires that government evaluation plans
incorporate information related to establishing, operating, and improving an
electronic integrated evaluation system. In line with this e-government strategy,
an electronic system is a central component of the government performance
management and evaluation system.
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12. In 2007, the Korean government launched the electronic Integrated Public
Service Evaluation System (e-IPSES). This system serves as the central
platform for administering all government performance evaluations. The elec-
tronic system not only allows all agencies to be linked but also integrates the
performance evaluation information produced by various management and
evaluation systems in real time (e.g., Online Business Process Management
System, Electronic HR Management System, Business Reference Model,
Digital Budget and Accounting System, and National Science & Technology
Information Service Database).
The e-IPSES serves as the core of the whole IT-based performance manage-
ment system. Its use is beneficial for both evaluators and evaluatees. The
evaluatees can easily upload their performance plans online. Likewise, the eva-
luators have real-time online access to an agency’s submitted self-evaluation
reports. Therefore, the agencies evaluated can reduce their workload by doing
their paperwork online. Once an agency inputs its performance information into
the database, it can use the database for various performance management
functions, such as self-evaluations, specific evaluations, and performance
measurement, among other purposes. This sophisticated system presents an
excellent opportunity to maximize the utility of the data.
A Hybrid System: Some Perspectives
In language and form, the Korean government performance management and
evaluation system visibly shows the influence of NPM, ReGo, and American
public administration. The merit system, performance evaluation, and perfor-
mance-based remuneration have all been adopted by the Korean civil service.
Several programs, such as Management by Objectives, Performance Audits,
and the Korean Program Assessment Rating Tool, are adaptations of similar
programs in the United States. The FAGPE law of 2006 includes adaptations
of sections of the GPRA on which it was patterned. Nonetheless, the Korean
adaptations of these systems have features that distinguish them from their
U.S. counterparts.
Such features of the Korean system as its strong involvement of top political
leadership, its top-down structure and broad, encompassing nature, and its evalu-
ation orientation may be better understood in the context of Korea’s own institu-
tions, culture, and politics. The development of Korean politics and bureaucracy
has been shaped by attitudes that include submission to authority, a desire for
powerful leadership, and subservience of the individual to the state—influences
derived from Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, and Korea’s history of strong
authority and emphasis on homogeneity. Submissiveness to authority, a hierarch-
ical view of life, collectiveness, passivity or nonparticipation, centralized
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13. administration, and an orientation to tradition are dominant patterns of Korean
society and politics (Kim, 1999).
The hierarchical view of life, centralization, and collectiveness, combined
with an image of strong leadership, may help explain the direct involvement
of top political leadership in setting performance goals, standards, and indi-
cators, as well as the actual administration of the performance evaluation for
all agencies. These influences also explain the top-down orientation, broad,
encompassing nature of the system, and the emphasis on evaluation. Cultural
patterns reinforce the view that performance is how well one meets the goals
and targets cascaded down by higher authority. The emphasis on assessing
compliance and contributions to collective goals places the stress on
evaluation.
The involvement of civilians at all levels of performance evaluation is a
concrete manifestation of the Korean government’s desire to modernize and
democratize its systems and structures, a deliberate move to steer away from
the heavily centralized and authoritarian system of the recent past. The
inclusion of checks and balances is a departure from previous practices
under authoritarian rule. The formation of committee-type organizations
in the GPEC and the various evaluation committees at the central and local
government levels, where civilian members are more numerous than
government representatives, democratizes the evaluation process, adds
external expertise, and provides checks and balances. Civilian members also
improve the impartiality of the evaluations, since they have a less direct
stake in the outcomes.
The various components of the Korean government performance manage-
ment and evaluation system are integrated through a sophisticated
information technology system in the electronic Integrated Public Service
Evaluation System (e-IPSES). The adoption of such a system can be traced
back to the informatization programs of the late 1990s, and the adoption of
e-government systems that was partly spurred by a desire to improve the
public sector after the 1997 Asian financial crisis. This is also in line with
South Korea’s drive to be among the top IT countries, a goal it has realized
since the mid-2000s.
As Cavalluzo and Ittner (2004) suggest, organizations with sophisticated
information capabilities may find it easier to implement new performance
measurement systems. Considering the broad coverage of the system and the
large number of central agencies, local governments, public enterprises, and
quasi-governmental organizations that need to do performance goal-setting
and evaluation on a biannual basis, the adoption of such a comprehensive and
sophisticated information technology platform is both practical and necessary
to ensure efficient administration.
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14. OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES
The current government performance management and evaluation system of
South Korea is a substantial improvement over prior systems. Before 2006, only
a portion of ministerial activities was covered by the performance management
system, and existing systems were fragmented. Activities that did not involve
large expenditures and those for which the benefits of monitoring were deemed
small were excluded. Performance management received little support from top
management and little enthusiasm from line agencies. The system also lacked
systematization and transparency (Koh, Yun, & Lee, 2004)
The current system incorporates the extensive involvement of external
civilian representatives and experts. Per policy, many civilian experts from
academic and research institutions participate in the performance management
and evaluation process. The inclusion of government and civilians addresses
potential conflicts of interest and contributes to making the performance
management and evaluation process more impartial and credible.
The current system also creates excellent opportunities for performance goal
setting. This means that each individual agency participates in evaluating its
own performance as measured against self-determined performance goals and
targets. Self-evaluation strengthens the agency’s autonomous performance man-
agement capacity. Organizations establish their own self-evaluation committees,
and agency heads are tasked with preparing self-evaluation plans. Individual
officials and employees have similar opportunities through performance agree-
ments. Goal setting, when used correctly with good managerial practices, can
improve motivation. Lock and Latham (1990) noted that the opportunity to
set their own performance targets creates an opportunity for participation and
empowerment of the agencies and individuals involved, enhances motivation,
and consequently leads to better performance. This is only accurate if the
participants use the opportunity to set realistic and challenging goals, however.
As studies show, participative goal-setting and performance feedback can lead
to improved performance only when they lead the individual to set challenging
goals. If setting performance goals is treated merely as compliance or as an
opportunity to obtain higher scores, the actual performance and outcomes
may not have the desired impacts.
Lee, Hong, and Kang (2007) studied the status of the system shortly after the
new system based on the FAGPE law of 2006 was established. Initially, they
found, a significant amount of attention was given to the self-evaluation compo-
nent—in particular, the customer-satisfaction component— with little attention
to the specific evaluation component. They also observed an overlap in the areas
of specific evaluation and self-evaluation. There were also disparities in the
evaluation and budget-cycle schedules, which made a timely reflection of the
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15. results of evaluation in the budget process difficult. In the self-evaluation
component, they observed that there were too many indicators to be measured.
A meta-evaluation conducted by Kong (2008) highlighted the impact of the
top-down nature of the system. Since the impetus for the evaluation came from
administrative initiatives and legislative mandates rather than agency needs,
designers tended to focus more on the technical aspects of the evaluation than
on fundamental issues, such as why a new management system was needed and
the value it would contribute to the organization. Kong also observed a tendency
for the system to be used for score-keeping rather than performance management.
Yoon and Lim (2009) found that the mid- to long-term performance
management strategic plans produced by government agencies lacked logical
connections to the annual performance management execution plans. In terms
of performance rewards, there were issues related to a tendency toward
leniency. Information from performance evaluations was not clearly connected
to performance pay. Performance information was not substantially utilized.
More recently, Keum, Yang, Lee, Cho, and Choung (2014) conducted a
nationwide survey of Korean government employees regarding the performance
management system. Asked whether the current system should continue,
36.06% of respondents were positive, 22.60% were negative, and 41.35% were
neutral. Understanding of the system was somewhat low, with the average score
being only 3.41 on a 1–5 scale where 5 was the highest. This implies that many
government employees do not know much about the details of the system.
Additionally, the feedback process and the link between the performance and
reward systems are lacking. Only 31.7% of the respondents were satisfied with
the link between performance and the reward system.
The importance of trust is recognized as a key factor in performance manage-
ment systems (Grizzle, 2002). When there is a lack of trust, it is difficult to accept
variations in pay. Employees who fear that the system will be used as a basis for
layoffs and those who feel that it presents an opportunity to get higher scores and
higher remuneration may attempt to manipulate the system. This can lead to nega-
tive behaviors, such as keeping targets low or ignoring tasks that are not rated.
The reported low or incomplete use of performance evaluation results raises
issues of cost and trust as well as questions regarding the rationale for the
adoption of such a system in the first place. Organizations essentially adopt a
performance evaluation system in order to gather relevant information and
use it to improve organizational and individual performance. Establishing and
developing a performance management system is an expensive and tedious
undertaking. When a substantial portion of the tediously gathered performance
information is not utilized, significant public resources are wasted. This may
bolster perceptions that evaluation is largely an empty exercise, which in turn
may further erode the trust of agencies and public employees in the system.
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16. In accordance with expectancy theory and similar models, the use of rewards or
performance-based remuneration is a common strategy employed by organizations
to support the accomplishment of their strategic goals, improve organizational
effectiveness and work quality, and enhance employee job satisfaction (Lawler,
1996). The adoption of this principle in Korean public administration is evident
in the adoption of systems that monitor and take account of individual performance.
There are undeniable tensions in the shift from a centralized, hierarchical, and
top-down system to a democratized, merit- and performance-based system. In
earlier periods, appointments, promotions, remuneration, and rewards were
determined primarily on the basis of age and seniority. This runs contrary to
American public administration notions of individual merit and performance.
The resulting system in South Korea can be viewed as a hybrid system. Its form
is patterned on and influenced by the U.S. and Western system, but its
institutional and cultural context is distinctly Korean. Dahlström and Lapuente
(2010) noted that the Korean civil service is radically moving from a heavily
seniority-based remuneration system to one that links performance and pay.
Recent civil service policies dictate that performance, along with length of
service and position, be included as a basis of remuneration.
This will likely continue to pose challenges, given the pervasive Confucian influ-
ence in Korean society in general. The high degree of respect paid to those in higher
positions, which prevents subordinates from questioning superiors or deviating
from group norms, beliefs, and practices, and the pursuit of group harmony at
the cost of individual expression and happiness, have contributed to the develop-
ment of an authoritarian bureaucracy (Kim, 2000). In a society where younger
employees are expected to defer to more senior ones, it is not unusual to encounter
situations where the most senior officials regularly get the highest performance
evaluations regardless of actual performance. This is the biggest challenge in
establishing a merit- and performance-based management and evaluation system.
Several years after the reform that brought about its most comprehensive
form to date, South Korea’s government performance management and evalu-
ation system has settled in and permeates most of the bureaucracy. In his recent
evaluation, Hur (2013) notes that Korean central government agencies now have
a better understanding of policy processes and activities and are now accus-
tomed to setting strategic and annual performance plans, monitoring perfor-
mance, conducting evaluations, interpreting results, and undertaking necessary
policy or performance adjustments. However, the Government Performance
Evaluation Committee has limited authority. It makes decisions on evaluation
activities, but does not have the authority to spend budgets and take follow-
up actions. Furthermore, the personnel complement of GPEC is not commensur-
ate to its responsibilities. Its members are not full-time, most of them serve only
one term, and they meet only on an irregular basis.
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17. Performance management is different from “managements of performances”
(Bouckaert & Halligan, 2008). In managements of performances, different
performance management systems are established for specific management
functions. However, in performance management, performance information is
systematically integrated, coherent, comprehensive, and consistent. Perfor-
mance information is produced in order to be utilized. Good performance mea-
surements do not automatically guarantee the utilization of the performance
data. When employees are measured and evaluated with a poor reward system,
they are not happy. Organizations with unhappy employees cannot be success-
ful, nor can they go to the next level.
Conclusion
The public sector reforms adopted by the Korean government in the area of
performance management and evaluation visibly bear the stamp of New Public
Management, Reinventing Government, and related principles and strategies
from the United States and the West. The adoption and implementation of these
systems however, have been strongly influenced by the Confucianism, the centra-
lized, top-down structure, and sense of hierarchy rooted in Korean society. Thus,
the resulting system is a hybrid that combines Western elements with Korean
values. It is tied together by the country’s sophisticated information technology
platform. While the policy and physical infrastructure are already in place and
the system is already operational, it is still far from having attained maturity.
The status of South Korea’s system may be summarized in three broad points.
First, the Korean government’s current performance management and
evaluation system has developed distinct characteristics in the following areas:
direct involvement of top political leadership in setting performance goals and
evaluation standards, and in administering the actual evaluations; the broad
coverage of the system, which includes central government agencies, local gov-
ernments, quasi-governmental organizations, and public enterprises; the strong
emphasis on the evaluation component; the strong involvement of civilians at
all levels; and the central role of information technology in the system. These fea-
tures reflect the distinct culture, context, and needs of the Korean public sector.
Second, the Korean government has been able to utilize its advanced infor-
mation capabilities in developing an advanced IT-based system in the electronic
Integrated Public Service Evaluation System (e-IPSES) that offers much poten-
tial. The overall evaluation process is fast, efficient, and can generate a diverse
range of data that can be utilized for various purposes. At present, however, the
performance evaluation data generated are in many instances not being put to
good use, and thus the potential of the IT-based system is yet to be maximized.
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18. Third, challenges in early implementation include issues in the quality of
performance contracts and performance management plans; the link between
objectives and plans, policy performance and individual performance, and between
performance, evaluation, and rewards; and the low use of performance evaluation
results, and low trust and commitment to the system. Operationally speaking, the
challenges include the system’s broad coverage, which makes administration
difficult. The limited personnel and authority of the Government Performance
Evaluation Committee are not commensurate to its broad responsibility and func-
tions. As such, delegated agencies conduct evaluations that are partly independent
of GPEC in practice. A bigger challenge is presented by cultural tendencies that
hinder fair and objective performance evaluation and management (e.g., respect
and deference to superiors, higher authority, and the group).
The Korean government has succeeded in establishing a comprehensive, func-
tioning performance management and evaluation system and in enforcing system-
wide compliance with performance measurement and evaluation requirements. The
sophisticated IT platform and the comprehensiveness of the system, particularly
the way it seeks to tie together performance, personnel, budget, and remuneration,
make for an ambitious but potentially effective system. It is clear, however, that the
system will need to overcome the authoritarian legacies of the past.
Acknowledgment
This article was written as part of Konkuk University’s research support program for
its faculty on sabbatical leave in 2013.
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Seung-Bum Yang is an Associate Professor of Public Administration at Konkuk University, Seoul, South
Korea. He has published articles in Public Performance & Management Review, Journal of Business and
Psychology, Public Personnel Management, and International Review of Public Administration.
Ador Revelar Torneo is an Associate Professor of Political Science at De La Salle University, Manila,
Philippines. His work has been published in Philippine Political Science Journal, Asian Politics and
Policy, Asia-Pacific Social Science Review, and International Journal of Technology, Policy and
Management.
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