Explain the concept of Anonymity. Distinguish between Anonymity and Neutrality.
Anonymity, adjective “anonymous”, comes from the Greek phrase anonymia, meaning “without a name” or even “namelessness”. In colloquial usage, “anonymous” is used to refer to situations where the acting individual’s name is unknown.
Some writers have argued that namelessness, though technically correct, doesn’t capture what’s more professionally at stake in contexts of anonymity. The key notion here is that a person be non-identifiable, unreachable, or even untrackable. Anonymity is seen as a technique, or a way of achieving, certain other values, for example solitude, or freedom.
A significant example for anonymity being not only protected, but enforced by law is just about the vote in free elections. In many other situations (such as discussion between strangers, buying some item or service at a store), anonymity is traditionally recognized as natural. Additionally, there are various situations in which a individual may choose to withhold their identity.
Acts of charity are completed anonymously when benefactors don’t wish to be acknowledged. A person who feels threatened might attempt to mitigate that threat through anonymity.
A witness to a crime might want to prevent retribution, for example, by anonymously calling a crime tip line. Criminals might proceed anonymously to hide their participation in a crime.
Anonymity might also be made unintentionally, through the reduction of identifying information due to the passage of time or a harmful event.
Cryptocurrency & Bitcoin is an biggest example of Anonymity in the world right now.
Also read | Relationship of public administration with politics economic and psychology
Difference between Anonymity and Neutrality.
The social role of bureaucracy as a neutral instrument in the hands of political masters gained acceptance under certain political and cultural circumstances.
Anonymity meant that the civil servant would merely advise the politician from behind and would be protected from being exposed to the din and fury of politics. Neutrality means a kind of political sterilization, the bureaucracy remaining unaffected by the changes in the flow of politics.
The civil servant has been axiomatically considered as politically neutral. There might be changes in political leadership, but the civil servant would be unfailingly offering ‘technical’ advice to the political master keeping himself aloof from the ‘politics’ of the day. The bureaucracy has thus been portrayed as a universal and permanent institution uncontaminated by the frailties and frivolities of politics.
