civil service

Syllable breakdown

Dictionary meaning

the body of permanent, professional, non-political government employees who staff the administrative machinery of the state and implement government policy across all departments and agencies, carrying out their duties in accordance with the instructions of elected ministers while maintaining continuity, institutional memory, and professional expertise across changes of government; the modern civil service in the United Kingdom emerged from the Northcote-Trevelyan reforms of 1854, which replaced patronage appointment with competitive examination, merit-based selection, and a permanence that made civil servants independent of electoral politics; in Westminster-model systems the civil service serves ministers of whatever party forms government with equal professionalism and impartiality, a principle of political neutrality that is central to the constitutional order; in other systems the senior civil service may be more closely tied to political appointments or may operate as a more openly partisan instrument of the governing party

Examples

• She joined the civil service as a graduate entrant and rose to permanent secretary after thirty years in the Treasury.
• The independence of the civil service from political control is a cornerstone of good governance in Westminster systems.