Essays on New Public Management

Governance and public management

In the end of the previous century sociologists used to claim that the public management field сould be hardly recognized by comparison with the classic perceptions, elaborated by Max Weber and Ferdinand Toennies (McLaughlin et al, 2002, p.5). While in the 19th and the largest part of the 20th century public administration was primarily associated with hierarchical organizations, governed by strong leaders, the end of the 20th century is characterized by the rising neutrality of civil servants and flattening structures. Moreover, the era of the Internet brought about the complex connections between the government, companies and NGOs that serve ...

called and held to account

Introduction

Traditional models of accountability, primarily those of elections and legislative scrutiny, are no longer sufficient in holding governments accountable. While Emy and Hughes (1988) argue that accountability dilemmas have been long standing within ministerial government, they see accountability failures as an indication of mechanisms corrupted by political interest. The rise of new social movements is a strong indication of the collective desire of citizens to interrupt the “chain of accountability”. The desire to influence political decision makers is a reflection of a growing assumption that the democratic deficit facing most western governments requires experiments ...