Frits van der Meer holds the endowed CAOP chair ‘Comparative Public Sector and Civil Service Reform’ at the Institute of Public Administration since June 2011. His ongoing research activities concentrate on (comparative) public sector reform, the Enabling State and government performance. This line of research is set in the context of a gradually changing multi-level governance system and the emergence of an enabling state. Themes of interests in this area are, for instance, the analysis of the interrelationship between the changing size, composition and professionality dimensions of governments and civil service systems on the one hand, and their per-formance on the other.

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Frits van der Meer holds the endowed CAOP chair ‘Comparative Public Sector and Civil Service Reform’ at the Institute of Public Administration. His ongoing research activities concentrate on (comparative) public sector reform, the Enabling State and government performance. This line of research is set in the context of a gradually changing multilevel governance system and the emergence of an enabling state. Themes of interests in this area are, for instance, the analysis of the interrelationship between the changing size, composition and professionality dimensions of governments and civil service systems on the one hand, and their performance on the other.

He has been involved in international comparative research in this area recently in a project sponsored by the European Union on institutional capacity and performance of the EU member states. In addition he has managed of international research networks, such as the Civil Service Systems Consortium of major international academic experts in this particular field. Besides he is doing research on administrative history.

As director of the Leiden Centre for public sector Reform, he has worked with governments in a wide range of countries and with international organizations on a regular basis. He is also currently in charge of the professional Public Administration master programme.

Frits van der Meer is working at the Institute of Public Administration since 1985. Before he was employed by the Ministry of the Interior (Council on local government). He studied economic history at Leiden University and graduated in 1983. In 1993 he finished his PhD in social science on Ambtenaren in Nederland. Omvang, bureaucratisering en representativiteit van het ambtelijk apparaat. (Civil servants in the Netherlands: Size, bureaucratisation and representativeness of the civil service).

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