What is the criticism of Good Governance?

Good governance is thus a vague normative formulation which is very difficult to practice in its original form. The criticisms of the good governance can be summed up in the following points:

1. It draws very ideal picture of harmonious functioning of various stakeholders like State, Private Sector and civil society organizations like NGOs. In reality their relationship is complicated and guided by their struggle for supremacy in their respective spheres which hampers the process of governance and divert the resources in wrong directions.

2. Good governance advocates increasing participation of private bodies in the issues of governance. However practice shows that accountability for an activity which has been contracted out, and maintenance of ethical standards in private sector is problematic to maintain.

3. It seems that the concept tried to re invent the old politics administration dichotomy of the Wilsonian age which is nothing but a neo-liberal agenda to legitimize the profit making agenda of capitalist economies from the first world.

4. Good governance attempt to impose western notion of democracy and governance over the Third World. It neglects indigenous structures of governance alternative paradigms of developments.

5. To belittle the importance of public agencies in the Third World may prove disastrous due to the social and political issues (like communalism, casteism, racism, ethnic clashes) involved in the community life of the people from these countries.