Public Management and Administration - Owen E.hughes

and treacherous, and that the rhetorical dimension of public management is substantial,
in most countries.
At the beginning of their book the movement for public sector reform is described
as ‘a pandemic’ which is hardly neutral, scientific language (2000, p. 1):
The period since 1980 has witnessed a pandemic of public management reforms, which
has swept across much of the OECD world. The working lives of millions of public officials
have been substantially altered (and, in some tens of thousands of cases, prematurely
terminated). The ways and means of managing vast public budgets have been reshaped.
Large claims have been made for ‘savings’ and ‘efficiency gains’ (the inverted commas are
deployed here to indicate that such concepts are seldom straightforward and uncontestable).
In some countries huge quantities of previously publicly owned assets have been
sold to the private sector. The standards attained or aspired to by many service-providing
agencies have come under unprecedented scrutiny.
They claim the work of Osborne and Gaebler is not scientific or neutral and
then argue that ‘we do not think that we are the slaves of any single theory or
approach. On the other hand, it would be absurd to claim that we are somehow
“totally objective” or “theory-free” ’ (2000, p. 23). In reality, as these statements
show, they are as profoundly ideological as those they attack.
Other parts of the managerial programme are not notably ideological, unless
the word applies to the preference for private sector management theories and
techniques. Performance management might be considered new Right ‘neo-
Taylorist’ ideology, but it could also reflect an older tradition of ensuring value
for scarce public money. Flexibility in personnel practices might be argued to
be ideological, but it could also be a realization that traditional administrative
employment practices are now irrelevant for other reasons.
The ideological argument against the public management is not substantiated.
The link between anti-state rhetoric and reform was taken away with
Thatcher, but reforms continued. In any case it could be regarded as equally
ideological to support the bureaucratic model of administration or a larger role
for government in society.
The impact on democracy
Conclusion 271
One serious criticism of the public management reforms, particularly those of
the new public management, is that they are against the precepts of democracy.
There are four main points. First, it is argued by some that democracy requires
bureaucracy. Secondly, it may be claimed that there is an endemic reduction in
political accountability, hence in democratic accountability, as public managers
are themselves accountable for results, thereby allowing politicians to avoid
accountability. Thirdly, it could be argued that outcomes are not evenly distributed,
that equity considerations are of little concern in the reform process.
Fourthly, there is a reduction in scale and scope by government. While it could