So that public service continues to meet the challenges of our company – Liberation

Faced with the distrust of citizens vis-à-vis the State, institutions or politics, what role can local authorities play? Such was the object of a conference organized in Rouen by the national center of the territorial public service. An event that Release is a partner.

Resolutely attached to public services, the French express legitimate expectations and requirements for them as evidenced by the Way Opinion Survey carried out in February 2025 for the Sens of Public Service Collective. Maintain them and develop them by innovating and improving their performance is a major issue. Local public service has greatly developed its expertise and creativity with decentralization: it implements the values ​​of the Republic and demonstrates its usefulness and performance on a daily basis, as during the Covid crisis. It contributes to maintaining social ties and facilitating the lives of our fellow citizens (drinking water, transport, nurseries, waste, etc.).

Public debate can only be fruitful if The future of public service is not exclusively addressed from a budgetary angle: reinvest in equal access (in particular by the human presence at the counter), evolve towards an ecologically and socially exemplary administration and transforming public service by democratic listening are part of the proposals of the sense of public service. Local communities, by their local link with citizens, by the territorial network of the public services they organize, by the accessibility they provide, have an essential role to play in the renewal of our social pact.

They conduct public policies that promote social cohesion and living together, especially in cultural and sporting matters. They know how to organize the conditions of the meeting and the debate, favoring dialogue, listening and the spirit of nuance. And are thus well placed to help build decisions based on the deliberation, the strength of the collective and the association of all the energies of society. It is often they who maintain human presence on the ground, expected by our fellow citizens, taking care to reduce the digital fracture. They invest in a pragmatic and concrete way for the ecological transition by ensuring the social acceptability of actions.

Consequently, how to act as a territorial leader to consolidate local public service and help our organizations conduct their public policies in the period of current ecological, digital and democratic transition? By allowing public officials to seize these issues because they are a force to achieve this ambition! So that the public service continues to meet the challenges of our society, those who deliver it must be trained, recognized, valued and protected. With the consequence:

Restoring their pride to public officials, in reverse of a throbbing and unfounded bashing, is a condition of loyalty and attractiveness. Let us not forget that the public service always plays a function of social elevator as pointed out by France Strategy in a note in February 2025.

Protect them, in particular the reception positions, because the legitimate requirements of users (simplicity, speed, transparency) must be expressed in mutual respect. This implies developing their qualification and supporting them as they embody public service in the relationship with citizens. In a 2019 work on museum trades, the historian Odile Join-Lambert shows, for example, that the more a profession is far from the public, the more valued and vice versa.

Take care of the quality of work by preserving initiative and autonomy and improving recognition of the work done, in particular by just remuneration.

Contribute to the exemplarity of public services in the ecological and digital transition by coconstructing a common culture of sobriety to integrate in our public policies.

Finally, develop the ability to collect and take into account the expertise of users, to manage emotions in interpersonal relationships at work, promote work in collaboration and in network.