INTRODUCTION

The Master of Public Administration (MPA) programme is designed to benefit and tap the experiences of practitioners currently working in the Kenyan public service and from other organisations. The programme also targets public servants and other interested individuals from other countries in the region and beyond.  As a needs-based programme, it enables students to acquire requisite knowledge and skills to improve their performance in public service and develop insights and skills needed to plan, formulate, execute policy, as well as to monitor and evaluate.

The programme has been developed in consultation with the key stakeholders in Kenya’s public service, namely the Ministry of State for Public Service and the Kenya Institute of Administration (KIA).  The programme shall be jointly coordinated by the Department of Political Science and Public Administration at the University of Nairobi and the KIA.  KIA has recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the University to that effect.  For purposes of quality assurance, the programme shall be run in conformity with regulations governing University of Nairobi academic programmes.

The MPA programme has been developed in response to the increasing demand for an efficient, effective, accountable and representative public service in light of the fast changing economic, social and political environment in Kenya and in the international milieu.  Indeed, in the past decade, many public sector reforms have been initiated and implemented with a view to making public service instrumental in making the country positively adjust to the new demands generated by changes in the domestic and international arena.  In particular, the successful implementation of the Kenya Constitution  2010, Vision 2030 and the all-important documents that now form the basis for development policy making and implementation, depends, to a large extent, on the public service.  As Kenyans endeavour to fulfill vision 2030, there is the need to retrain and re-equip the current crop of officers as well as those who have just joined or intend to join the service with the necessary conceptual and analytical tools to analyse, formulate and conduct policies.