This research focuses on one of the civil service recruitment systems in Korea, specifically, the system through which people are recruited for civil service from the private and public sectors through open competition (hereinafter referred to as the “Civil Servant Open Recruitment System” or the “System”), and analyzes public servants’ perception of the operation of the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System by local autonomous organizations and enumerates ways to develop the System with a focus on North Chungcheong Province (Chungcheongbuk-do).
The Civil Servant Open Recruitment System is the product of the representative human resources reform policy of the Kim Dae-Jung administration, dubbed “the Government of the People,” and was implemented with the goal of enhancing the competitiveness of public posts by introducing openness and the principle of competition to the closed culture of civil service in Korea at the time.
This research reviews the diverse methods that have been introduced in previous theses, elicits problems of the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System based on a questionnaire-based survey of public servants working for the Chungcheongbuk-do provincial government, and suggests ways of developing the System further.
Carried out for eight days in January 2015, the questionnaire?based survey was conducted in order to gain an understanding of civil servants’ perception of the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System. Through random sampling, 220 civil servants working at the Chungcheongbuk-do government office, the agencies controlled by it, and the secretariat of Chungcheongbuk-do provincial council were chosen to participate in the survey, representing the population of 3,206 civil servants serving for Chungcheongbuk-do. Steps were taken, where possible, to ensure that no department of the above institutions was excluded from the survey sample so as to enhance the representativeness of the samples.
The section of this thesis regarding the significance of the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System reviews and summarizes the concept, legal grounds, and implementation process of the System. The section on the introduction of recruitment methods under the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System divides the recruitment methods, based on current statutes, into three types: namely, the appointment of former civil servants, the appointment of persons from the private sector, and the appointment of both former civil servants and private sector employees. It also provides research on the three recruitment methods. Of course, the differences between central administrative ministries and local autonomous organizations in terms of the operation of the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System are also explained. Furthermore, case studies on the operation of civil servant open recruitment systems in foreign countries were updated by referring to previous relevant theses and relevant homepages of institutions in foreign countries.
This thesis includes a review of a variety of literature and statutes on the operation of the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System and references to numerous research papers, white papers, and publications issued by previous and current central ministries and agencies in charge of civil servant human resource management since 2000.
The questionnaires were analyzed by conducting a frequency analysis, t-test, ANOVA analysis, and other types of analyses via SPSS, a software package, the results of which provide empirical indications of civil servants’ overall perception of the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System.
The policy tasks suggested by this thesis for the development of the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System by local autonomous organizations include the provision of measures that guarantee benefits and job security sufficient to attract and secure private professionals and experts in the public sector. In particular, further study needs to done on whether the ratio of the number of open competition positions to the total number of civil service positions and the scope of open competition positions are uniformly implemented across the public sector, or determined by the heads of local autonomous organizations.
Most of all, the mindset of the heads of local autonomous organizations plays a major role in order for the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System to be stabilized in Korea. As such, what is needed here is not for the leadership to maintain the current stability but to proactively prepare for and pursue future changes to the System. The values of the heads of local autonomous organizations, which are oriented toward the abolishment of past practices and creative thinking, can serve to motivate and influence the actions of civil servants. Moreover, in order for the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System to be effective, it is necessary to select competent, talented individuals who are able to resist the temptation of nepotism and willing to devote themselves to improving the welfare of local residents and carrying out honest administration. For the sake of fairness, it would be best to exclude former and current civil servants, as much as possible, from the screening and interview processes of the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System.
It should be recognized that this research has certain limitations in that the means of developing the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System were elicited not based on diverse data but on civil servants’ perception of the System, thereby creating the possibility that the results of this research may differ somewhat from the actual reality. However, I believe that the civil servants’ evaluations of the operation of the Civil Servant Open Recruitment System can make an important contribution to the institutionalization of alternative measures that are needed to successfully stabilize the System.

* key word : The Civil Servant Open Recruitment System, civil servants’ perception, local autonomous organizations, ways to develop