Immediately after the 9/11 attacks, the United States Congress came up with a solid plan and formed the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to assists in maintaining domestic order and security. This was a plan meant to ensure that the country is always upto date on security issues. The DHS comprised of 22 departmental agencies with a total of almost 200,000 federal workers. However, every department faces a lot of organizational challenges (Kettl, 2004). The DHS has been under scrutiny from the United States General Accountability Office due to some loopholes in management and functioning by its staff. However, the DHS has reached essential milestones in maintaining the United States general security by the development of strategic operations and workforces in the country and expansion of new/ existing programs to combat insecurity (Hocevar, Jansen & Thomas, 2004). This paper explores issues that are facing the Department of Homeland Security in delivering their services to the citizens of the United States. Besides, it also highlights the underlying performance and management challenges that have hampered employee efforts in accomplishing DHS mission of delivering effective and efficient security operations.
Persistent Inter/Intra- Agency Conflicts
Department of Homeland Security, after two decades of existence still experiences a lot of challenges in delegating their functions and organizational structure. The department has generally struggled through constant public and congressional scrutiny and coordinating between its 22 departmental agencies (Major Management/ Performance Challenges facing DHS). According to some security experts, lack of properly responding to these challenges has made the DHS department to get branded as a dysfunctional unit. With a limited budget in place, the department must ensure that its challenges are addressed and looked into. And as the department tries to find an effective way of dealing with these issues at hand, it must identify and efficiently implement sound decisions for the benefit of the nation's security and their public image (Kettl, 2004). With an increase in cases of cybersecurity and terrorism, the department must ensure that integrity and ethics prevail among its members for effective mitigation of the threats.
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Over the years, the departments of the DHS have operated as a collection of departmental components rather than a single corporate entity. The issue has culminated into a lack of organizational progress and effectiveness in ensuring that the missions and visions of DHS get achieved. Organizational issues lead to ineffective management and decision making in the department. The integration of several departments such as the Coast Guard, INS, the TSA, CIA and the Federal Bureau of Investigations has created a lot of management issues (Hocevar, Jansen & Thomas, 2004). With these departments operating under one roof, it has been challenging to coordinate and delegate duties due to lack of a central department for intelligence collection. Every department has been on a mission of outdoing another department to show their superiority. The conflict has deepened in assigning and in delegating of jurisdictional roles and responsibilities. As a result, the processing and intelligence sharing has reduced further between the departments resulting in difficulties in the process of mitigating criminal activities within the country. Intelligence sharing is the single most effective way of countering terrorism acts in the country; it ensures that law enforcement agencies are updated on criminal activities and criminals on watch lists.
Ethical Dilemmas within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS)
Every employee of the DHS has a responsibility of ensuring that accountability and transparency are adhered to when offering their services to Americans. Their roles must correspond to the needs of the constitutional laws and ethical rules and not for private gain. In ensuring that Americans have faith and trust in the department, DHS employees must adhere to the moral doctrines set by the constitution and the supplementary agency doctrines (Homeland Security at a Crossroads).
DHS employee faces a lot of ethical issues in their line on/off duty. One of the primary moral dilemma that they always face revolve around upholding the law and the rights of Americans. Secondly, the use of force and impartially has been a subject of discussion among members of the department and the public at large. Stereotyping/ profiling has also been an issue in America today. Racial profiling has led to a series of poor coordination between the department and the community getting profiled.
In most cases, the African American community has been at the centre stage since their numbers have increased significantly in incarceration facilities. During their off duty life, most officers and DHS employees have acted in a manner that does not uphold the dignity of the department (Kettl, 2004). As a result, their behaviours and acts have placed them under public scrutiny creating a massive rift between them and the society that expects them to abide by the laws of the land each time.
Recently, black lives matter organization highlighted the plight of the black community in America. One of them was racial profiling by the security departments when performing their duties. The primary aim of the movement was to hold any security employee accountable for their acts. Ethical doctrines require security officers to act per the situations that they find themselves in. For instance, one cannot justify the use of force in issues that do not need the application of force. The ethical dilemma has often been when and how to apply force when criminal situations occur (Hocevar, Jansen & Thomas, 2004).
The Department of Homeland Security primary functions is to make the United States safer. In the process of delegating their duties towards national safety, the department has faced several challenges ranging from immigration security, border issues, terrorism, cybercrime and emergency/ disaster response. In most cases, the department has found it hard to tackle some of these issues due to the technology associated with some of these crimes (Homeland Security at a Crossroads). For instance, during Hurricane Katrina which created havoc in parts of New Orleans and New York, the department was accused of stereotyping a particular population of Americans and responding late to their calls. The department experienced difficulties in mitigating the disaster due to poor communication and conflict of interests among various departments (Kettl, 2004). The department must be well equipped and ready for any emergency disaster. Stereotype/ profiling must also have mutinied during rescue missions since every citizen has an equal stake in the country.
Conclusion
In a nutshell, DHS must strengthen its management department to bolster its effectiveness in offering security services to American citizens. Currently, DHS has worked tirelessly in addressing these management challenges through implementing strategies aimed at creating transparent and accountable employee departments. The community has also been welcomed to assess the work done by the DHS. Through community policing and relationship, the DHS has earned more trust from the public which has in return supported it in its operation in the country. The DHS must create a department that will educate their employees on how to cope with day to day work dilemmas in the process of duty delegation. It will see a drop in corruption among officers and improved relationship between the department and the public.
Recommendations
The Department of Homeland Security must ensure that it establishes a more secure and stronger internal and mature control environment. Through the efforts, significant strides will get made in the provision of effective leadership within the organizational structure. Significantly, more scrutiny must get done when absorbing employees into DHS. A more neutral body must also be created to ensure that feuds within the departments are solved collectively and with transparency. In doing this, there will be more improvement within the employees within the organizational structure.
The DHS must also partner with various stakeholders in ensuring that they maximize their operations. The stakeholders can be the community around and various security departments within and outside the United States borders. By fostering more on community policing and partnering with private organizations, the department can help curb recurrent threats in America today like Cyber-crime, immigration issues, gun violence, and drug trafficking. In essence, partnership and maintaining good relationships with other stakeholders will foster mission accomplishment.
Lastly, an oversight agency should be created to help in overseeing the operations of the DHS. According to 2008 government reports, a series of mismanagement of funds and lack of accountability in the Department of Homeland Security led its underperformance. Creating an internal oversight department and internal whistleblowers will help reduce the risks in the Department. The oversight authorities will also aid in writing legislation and planning adequately for the DHS to minimize misuse of funds experienced.
References
Hocevar, S., Jansen, E., & Thomas, G. F. (2004). Building collaborative capacity for homeland security (No. NPS-GSBPP-04-008). NAVAL POSTGRADUATE SCHOOL MONTEREY CA.
Homeland Security at a Crossroads: Evolving DHS to Meet the Next Generation of Threats. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.csis.org/analysis/homeland-security-crossroads-evolving-dhs-meet-next-generation-threats
Kettl, D. F. (2004). The department of homeland security's first year: a report card. Century Foundation.
Primary Management and Performance Challenges Facing the Department of Homeland Security. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.oversight.gov/report/dhs/major-management-and-performance-challenges-facing-department-homeland-security-1
