The Politics of Commodification

2021 ◽  
pp. 40-61
Author(s):  
Christoph Hermann
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Private Economy ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
Market Values ◽  
Neoliberal Reforms ◽  
New Public ◽  
Natural Tendency ◽  
Over Time

Even though commodification is a quasi-natural tendency of capitalist economies, the extent of commodification can vary over time, depending, among other things, on government intervention. In the last three decades, neoliberal reforms have fueled (re-)commodification. This chapter looks at six major policies: privatization, liberalization, deregulation, marketization, New Public Management, and austerity. Privatization promotes commodification by abolishing non-commodified alternatives to the sale of goods and services. Liberalization fuels commodification by exposing producers to competition and by forcing them to make profits. Deregulation eliminates restrictions that in one way or another limit commodification. Marketization creates markets in economic and social spheres where no markets have existed before, while New Public Management promotes metric output measurements that closely resemble what, in the private economy, are market values. Austerity and related cuts in welfare expenditure drive re-commodification by making citizens more dependent on markets and on private alternatives to the welfare state.

Administrative convergence in the United Nations system? Patterns of administrative reform in four United Nations organizations over time

2021 ◽  
pp. 002085232110187
Author(s):  
Stephan Grohs ◽  
Daniel Rasch
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Decisive Role ◽  
Food And Agriculture ◽  
New Public ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
United Nations System ◽  
Nations System ◽  
Over Time

This article asks how and why United Nations organizations reform their administrative structure and processes over time. It explores whether we can observe a convergence towards a coherent administrative model in the United Nations system. Like in most nation states, reform discussions according to models like New Public Management or post-New Public Management have permeated international public administrations. Against this background, the question of administrative convergence discussed for national administrative systems also arises for United Nations international public administrations. On the one hand, similar challenges, common reform ‘fashions’ and an increasing exchange within the United Nations system make convergence likely. Yet, on the other hand, distinct tasks, administrative styles and path dependencies might support divergent reform trajectories. This question of convergence is addressed by measuring the frequency, direction and rationales for reforms, using a sample of four international public administrations from the United Nations’ specialized agencies (the Food and Agriculture Organization, International Labour Organization, International Monetary Fund and World Bank). We find that convergence depends on the area of reform (human resources or organizational matters are more harmonized than others) and time (some international public administrations are faster or earlier than others). Points for practitioners This article identifies different drivers of reforms, as well as several supporting conditions, and obstacles to reform in international public administration, which is useful for understanding and planning change management. It highlights the issues policymakers should consider when implementing reform measures, especially institutional context, administrative styles and relevant actor constellations. Among other things, it shows that: the establishment of coordination bodies clearly leads to more homogeneous administrative practices; executive heads have a decisive role in the shaping of administrative reforms and have a specific interest to foster coordination and control in public organizations; and autonomy enables organizations to pursue reform policies apt to their individual challenges.

scholarly journals Working Environment Activities in Hospitals: Expansion of Scope and Decentralization of Responsibility

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Per-Christian Borgen ◽  
Bente Vibecke Lunde
Keyword(s):  
Internal Control ◽  
Public Management ◽  
Final Section ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Health Science ◽  
Working Environment ◽  
Regulatory Requirements ◽  
Science Theory ◽  
New Public ◽  
Over Time

This article analyzes how two development traits in the regulatory requirements for Working Environment (WE) activities – an expansion of scope and a decentralization of responsibility – are understood and handled over time by actors responsible for WE activities in Norwegian hospitals. The expanded scope of WE activities is studied based on the requirements outlined in The Working Environment Act, public health science theory, and the WE challenges in hospitals. The decentralized responsibility for WE activities is studied based on Internal Control (IC) reform and other hospital reforms inspired by New Public Management (NPM). The final section of the article discusses the effects of the two development traits, and how these enlarge the line manager’s area of responsibility. The article is based on a qualitative, longitudinal study conducted in three Norwegian hospitals in 1998-1999 and 2013.

Public Management Reforms: One-Stop Shops to Digital Government

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin Knox ◽  
Saltanat Janenova
Keyword(s):  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Digital Government ◽  
Citizen Satisfaction ◽  
Sector Model ◽  
New Public ◽  
One Stop ◽  
The Impact ◽  
New Phase ◽  
Over Time

The concept of one-stop shops started as a relatively modest idea of providing information to public service users under one roof and helping citizens to navigate the complexities of multiple providers. Over time a business sector model accelerated the development of one-stop shops into a new phase of digitization influenced by the emergence of New Public Management with its emphasis on putting users at the center of public services provision. Technological progress afforded citizens access to the state and, in turn, promoted state-to-citizens interactions through multiple channels, both digital and physical. One-shop shops became inextricably linked to e-government which impacted both the developed and developing world, including authoritarian states. Although evidence of the impact of one-shop shops is still limited, not least because the concept has morphed over time, key improvements are listed as increased citizen satisfaction, reduced corruption, and greater efficiency. The pace of development has been such that the future suggests a move from one-stop shops to “no-stop shops.”

scholarly journals Meeting youth in movement and on neutral ground

2015 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
Morten Nissen
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Social Engineering ◽  
Youth Work ◽  
Pedagogical Practice ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
New Public ◽  
Industrial Crisis ◽  
Post Industrial

The article articulates an educational motto – expressed in the title – found in a ‘prototypical narrative’ of social youth work carried out by activists in Copenhagen in the 1990s. This way of modeling pedagogical practice is first outlined as different from the standardizing approach dominant in science. As a prototypical narrative, the story alternates between descriptions and contextualizations of events, theoretical debate, and analytical suggestions. The key idea that is unfolded is the ‘critical trans-pedagogy’ of a creation and tinkering of collectives and their participants in struggles for recognition, and for the democratic social engineering of a responsive welfare state. It is suggested that a singular historical situation spurred this development, both in the practical youth work, and in the theoretical traditions with which I could articulate it. This included the post-industrial crisis of labor, the post-cold-war shaking of state forms, New Public Management, and the simultaneous expansion and attack on the welfare state. It also included how the Foucauldian rethinking of power and the performative turn in the social sciences informed the broadly Vygotskian traditions. On these backgrounds, the youth work practices could be approached as generalizing, performative reenactments of social problems. The approach is finally spelled out in and around the story of one participant, before the concluding remarks return to the issue of how a prototypical narrative deals with theory.

Managers' subtle resistance to neoliberal reforms through and by means of management accounting

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Elodie Allain ◽  
Célia Lemaire ◽  
Gulliver Lux
Keyword(s):  
Social Services ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Management Accounting ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Services Sector ◽  
Neoliberal Reforms ◽  
New Public ◽  
Creative Resistance ◽  
Political Actions

PurposeWithin societies in the 21st century, individuals who are embedded in a controlled context that impedes their political actions deal with the tensions they are experiencing through attempts at resistance. Several studies that examine individual infrapolitics in organizations explain how the subtle mix of compliance and resistance are constructed at the level of individual identity in a complex mechanism that both questions the system and strengthens it. However, the interplay between managers' identities and management accounting tools in this process is a topic that deserves more investigation. The aim of this article is to understand how the subtle resistance of individuals constructs neoliberal reforms through management accounting (MA).Design/methodology/approachThe authors conducted a case study on three health and social organizations two years after major reforms were implemented in the health and social services sector in Québec, a province of Canada. These reforms were part of a new public management dynamic and involved the implementation of accounting tools, here referred to as New Public Management Accounting (NPMA) tools.FindingsThe authors’ findings show how managers participate in reforms, at the same time as attempt to stem the dehumanization they generate. Managers engage in subtly resisting, for themselves and for their field professional teams, the dehumanization and identity destruction that arises from the reforms. NPMA tools are central to this process, since managers question the reforms through NPMA tools and use them to resist creatively. However, their subtle resistance can lead to the strengthening of the neoliberal dynamic of the reform.Originality/valueThe authors contribute to both the literature of infrapolitics and MA by showing the role of NPMA tools in the construction of subtle resistance. Their article enriches the MA literature by characterizing the subtle forms of resistance and showing how managers engage in creative resistance by using the managerial potential flexibility of NPMA tools. The article also outlines how NPMA tools play a role in the dialectic process of resistance, since they aid managers in resisting reform-induced dehumanization but also support managers in reinventing and reinforcing what they are trying to fight. The authors’ study also illustrates the dialectic dynamic of resistance through NPMA in all its dimensions: discursive, material and symbolic. Finally, the authors contribute to management accounting literature by showing that NPMA tools are not only the objects of neoliberalization but also the support of backstage resistance to neoliberalization.

New Public Management

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Per Lægreid
Keyword(s):  
Public Administration ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
The Past ◽  
New Public ◽  
External Pressures ◽  
Institutional Contexts ◽  
Expanded Concept ◽  
Over Time

New Public Management (NPM) reforms have been around in many countries for over the past 30 years. NPM is an ambiguous, multifaceted, and expanded concept. There is not a single driving force behind it, but rather a mixture of structural and polity features, national historical-institutional contexts, external pressures, and deliberate choices from political and administrative executives. NPM is not the only show in town, and contextual features matter. There is no convergence toward one common NPM model, but significant variations exist between countries, government levels, policy areas, tasks, and over time. Its effects have been found to be ambiguous, inconclusive, and contested. Generally, there is a lack of reliable data on results and implications, and there is some way to go before one can claim evidence-based policymaking in this field. There is more knowledge regarding NPM’s effects on processes and activities than on outcome, and reliable comparative data on variations over time and across countries are missing. NPM has enhanced managerial accountability and accountability to users and customers, but has this success been at the expense of political accountability? New trends in reforms, such as whole-of-government, have been added to NPM, thereby making public administration more complex and hybrid.

New Public Management and Service Privatization in Australia

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Siobhan O'Sullivan
Keyword(s):  
Public Service ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Welfare To Work ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Private Companies ◽  
Employment Services ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
New Public ◽  
Australian Experience

Since at least the 1980s, New Public Management (NPM) has had a dramatic impact on public service delivery in Australia. NPM is a contested concept, but it is often closely associated with making government more businesslike, using a range of techniques such as the establishment of quasi-markets for the delivery of goods and services by private companies that work for government on short-term contracts. Australia’s strong embrace of NPM principles is most evident in its transformation of welfare-to-work under the Keating and Howard governments. Yet the evolution of Australia’s employment services system also points to some of the unresolved tensions inherent in NPM. In particular, the Australian experience suggests that it is difficult to strike a balance between maintaining control in a way that meets the expectations of citizens and allowing private companies freedom to innovate and capitalize.

The Scandinavian Tradition

2021 ◽  
pp. 94-115
Author(s):  
B. Guy Peters
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Public Administration ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Good Deal ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
New Public ◽  
Administrative Systems ◽  
Administrative Tradition ◽  
The Welfare State

The Scandinavian countries have a distinctive administrative tradition, although there is a good deal of variance among the four countries on some aspects of public administration. Although all democratic countries have some separation between administration and politics, this tends to be more pronounced in the Scandinavian countries, especially Sweden. Second, the administrative systems are closely linked with social actors through corporatist or corporate pluralist systems. This representation of the social interests is one component of an emphasis on participation in the public sector. And finally, public administration in these countries is responsible for delivering a large array of services associated with the welfare state. Despite the emphasis on the welfare state, public administration in these countries has been more open to New Public Management than the administrative systems in continental countries.

scholarly journals Changed Roles and Strategies of Professionals in the (co)Production of Public Services

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 59 ◽  
Author(s):  
van Gestel ◽  
Kuiper ◽  
Hendrikx
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Coping Strategies ◽  
Public Management ◽  
Public Services ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Market Regulation ◽  
Public Governance ◽  
State Reform ◽  
New Public ◽  
Welfare State Reform

This paper investigates the changed roles and strategies of professionals in a context of hybrid welfare state reform. This context exposes public professionals to market regulation and rationalization (new public management), and simultaneously expects them to work across professional borders to co-produce public services together with their clients, colleagues and other stakeholders (new public governance). Adopting a comparative perspective, we studied different types of professionals for their views on the implications of this reform mix on their work. Hence, we investigate ‘strategy’ at the macro level of public sector reform and at the micro level of professionals’ responses. The study is based on literature and policy documents, participatory observations and especially (group) interviews with professionals across Dutch hospitals, secondary schools and local agencies for welfare, care or housing. We found that professionals across these sectors, despite their different backgrounds and status, meet highly similar challenges and tensions related to welfare state reform. Moreover, we show that these professionals are not simply passive ‘victims’ of the hybrid context of professionalism, but develop own coping strategies to deal with tensions between different reform principles. The study contributes to understanding new professional roles and coping strategies in welfare state reform, in a context of changing relationships between professions and society.

scholarly journals New Zealand’s Economic Turnaround

2019 ◽  
pp. 264-282
Author(s):  
Michael Mintrom ◽  
Madeline Thomas
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
Government Response ◽  
Government Accounting ◽  
New Public ◽  
Economic Collapse ◽  
High Regard ◽  
Legislative Reforms

In the early 1980s, global events and New Zealand’s government response drove the country towards economic collapse. Debt, inflation, and unemployment grew. To address the crisis, several legislative reforms in the style of New Public Management were passed between the mid-1980s and early 1990s. The currency was floated, price and income controls were relaxed, state-owned enterprises such as the national airline were corporatized, government accounting was scrutinized, and outputs rather than inputs were monitored in government departments. These reforms transformed New Zealand into a country that holds transparency and accountability in high regard. The economy recovered, and the population flourished and gained better access to a wider range of goods and services. This chapter analyses the reasons and the circumstances that led to the success of New Zealand’s economic reforms. The authors also discuss what economic vulnerabilities remain for New Zealand and consider the extent to which the New Zealand model offers lessons for other countries.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document