There was a time when joining the Pakistan Civil Service was seen as the highest symbol of intellect and duty. These days, the civil service of Pakistan, once the pride of authority, stands as an irrelevant monument of an outdated era. In its current form, the CSS system is neither civil nor a service. It is a leftover of colonial administration that was built to control its subjects, not to serve citizens.
Our bureaucracy remains trapped in the lucidity of the 19th century, while the global civil service administers governance with 21st-century tools. We inherited the system from the British Indian Civil Service, established in 1858. It was then designed to rule, but not to reform. Because of its nature, It rewarded obedience, not creativity. And even after seven decades of independence, we are witnessing the same.
Every year, approximately 35,000 young Pakistanis appear for the Central Superior Services examination, but only 250 succeed, resulting in a pass rate of less than one percent. It appears rigorous on paper, but in reality, it measures nothing but memory and conformity. Ever since the inception of the CSS exam, it has assessed the candidates for their ability to reproduce facts, not the ability to solve problems or solutions.
Once inducted, a young officer begins his/her journey of a career of endless rotation — from assistant commissioner to deputy commissioner, then perhaps to chairperson of FBR, Ogra or PTA. Comparative analysis reflects that none of these roles require administrative instinct alone, but our CSS arrangement insists that one generalist can govern and administrate all domains. The outcome is perhaps inevitable — paralysis disguised as protocol.
According to FPSC data, only 15% of Pakistan’s 600,000 civil servants have relevant education. Pakistan operates with only 2.5 civil servants per 1,000 citizens and their training budget is only 0.5% of their salary. We have one of the most understaffed, undertrained and overcentralised bureaucracies in Asia. The world has moved on, as countries that once shared our bureaucratic DNA have modernised their public service as a knowledge-based profession.
The UK has 520,000 civil servants. That’s 7.6 per 1,000 citizens, serving inside their specialised professional streams, for example: digital policy, capital markets, energy and health. Around 60% are specialists, their continuous learning is institutionalised with 2.5% of salary budget and lateral recruitment from industry and academics, fostering innovation and promoting creativity.
The US goes further, with 2.1 million federal civil servants, or 6.3 per 1,000 citizens, with 75% specialists. Independent agencies and the Senior Executive Service balance bureaucrats with domain experts, thus ensuring leadership that is both competent and accountable. They evaluate their public service by results, not protocol rituals.
India has 3.2 million civil servants — 2.3 per 1,000, with 35% specialists, and now recruits professionals from the private sector and industry. Bangladesh, with 1.3 million — 7.5 per 1,000 — has transferred to digital, merit-based enlistment, ending its elitist past structure.
China has turned its bureaucracy into a technocratic engine, with seven million civil servants — 5 per 1,000 citizens, with 70 per ent specialists. It spends 4.0% of salaries on training and re-certification is compulsory. The Chinese National Academy trains over 100,000 cadres yearly in digital governance and macroeconomics. Japan and South Korea emulate that success. Japan’s 650,000 civil servants — 5.2 per 1,000 — comprise 65% specialists, while South Korea’s 1.1 million civil servants — 21.5 per 1,000 with 70% specialists — with 4.0% of total salaries committed to training and strong anti-corruption supervision.
Pakistan’s system looks lost in time: 600,000 civil servants managing 240 million people, less than 15% specialists, with 0.5% training budgets and their selection still based on one written exam. It is structured by design to breeds mediocrity, not merit.
Beyond the data lies a greater failure — moral degeneration. Our bureaucracy, once considered a sanctuary of integrity, has now evolved into an elite club of privilege. Principles are being replaced by postings and perks, young officers are losing direction and drawn into a culture of submissiveness to power rather than commitment to law. Now loyalty to superiors is rewarded more than loyalty to the state. When ambition is prized over ability, and closeness to power replaces professional ethics, it is no surprise that the system rots from within.
According to the Federal Public Service Commission, over 70% of CSS qualifiers hold degrees unrelated to their occupational groups, and less than 5.0% have any recognised education in economics, governance or law. By the time these civil servants reach senior policymaking positions, they often lack both expertise and institutional memory, largely due to decades of rotation across unrelated departments. The adoption of this practice has drastic consequences, visible everywhere. The country’s energy crisis is managed by civil servants who have never studied energy economics. Digital policy is shaped by officers unfamiliar with data. Education reform is directed by those who have never visited a classroom in any primary school. This is governance by chance.
Comparative analysis tells us that no nation can modernised its economy before modernising its bureaucracy. The Japanese reformed their administrative arrangement after 1945, entrenching permanent technical education in statecraft. Post-1978, the Chinese placed their engineers and economists at the heart of governance. South Korea went further in 1990 reforms and linked merit, technology and uprightness into a single governance philosophy. These countries understood that economic progress follows modernisation in their administrative affairs. In Pakistan, we are observing the reverse; our bureaucracy weakens faster than our institutions can recover.
We have a radical case for reforms, and by this, we do not mean cosmetic workshops or ceremonial evaluations. It must begin with dismantling the falsehood that one exam can harvest policymakers for every sector. We must incorporate specialisation pathways: security, energy, finance, education, cybercrime, digital governance, law and justice etc. Each pathway has its own separate professional exam, academy and promotion structure. Officers must rise within their professional domain, not through ministries.
We must also encourage lateral entry and make it institutionalised to bring professionals from academia, industry and the overseas qualified Pakistani diaspora into policy roles. From the UK to Singapore, every successful civil service flourishes on permeability between the private and public sectors. We must make continuous education mandatory, and every officer must undertake progressive retraining once every five years. The training budget must be increased from 0.5% to a minimum of 3.0% of total salaries, corresponding to global best practices.
There must be an autonomous commission for appointments and evaluations and it must be insulated from political interference. Promotions must be entwined with considerable results rather than connections, and above all, moral accountability must be predominant. It should be enforced not by NAB or anti-corruption bodies, but by internal ethics codes, peer review and public transparency.
The leadership concept at CSS must be reimagined: Our CSS collapse is not just structural, but philosophical. Leadership in our bureaucracy is only concerned with privilege, not purpose. Global outlook took the opposite path: the Chinese considered their officials as policy engineers; the Japanese treat them as national assets; the Singaporeans call them public innovators; whereas Pakistanis, tragically, treat them as protocol officers. Public service is not about status but about competence; not about authority but accountability. Until we change the mindset, there can be no structural reform.
Pakistan’s civil service needs renewal. It must rise again as a community of professionals guided by knowledge, integrity and duty. No political revolution, reform or foreign aid can save a nation run by amateurs. If Pakistan is to rebuild itself, it must rebuild the spine of its state, from a colonial hierarchy to a 21st-century, modern, technocratic and ethical service. Only then will the term ‘public servant’ recover its honour.
The writer is a political economist, public policy commentator and advocate for principled leadership and regional cooperation across the Muslim world.
The writer is a political economist, public policy commentator and advocate for principled leadership and regional cooperation across the Muslim world.
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