Public Management and Administration - Owen E.hughes

eform, this would actually be an enhancement of democracy as they are
elected where mandarins are not.
These arguments of Lynn and Massey are overstated. All that is being put
forward by the public management reforms is a new way of organizing within
government, that, whatever the extent of reform, what remains is the legal
structure of a bureaucratic state. As Borins argues (1999, p. 309):
The new public management can be understood as an agreement between politicians and
civil society, on the one hand, and the public service on the other. Politicians and civil
society are demanding a public sector that is more service-oriented and more performanceoriented.
In response they are willing to give public managers more autonomy and better
tools to do the job.
This is an instrumental view of management, no more and no less. Public management
is merely a tool for governments to use to improve the management
of their public sector. There is no claim for any difference in the way that governments
are chosen, in other words, no alteration in democratic regime.
Accountability and democracy
Conclusion 273
Arguments are made that the public management reforms reduce accountability,
and hence democracy, in two ways. First, and most important, the reforms may
reduce political accountability; if the manager is to be more accountable, then
the politician is axiomatically to be less accountable. Secondly, public accountability
may be reduced through contracting or other ways in which a function is
delivered by the private sector so there is no longer government involvement.
The first point is most obvious in Westminster-style parliamentary systems.
There the minister is presumed to be accountable for the acts of the administration
and is politically accountable through the legislature. Managers do
become more responsible for the operations they are in charge of, rather than
the minister who, while politically accountable, can avoid blame (Hondeghem,
1998). In the US, it has long been the practice that agency heads are themselves
accountable, with political accountability through the President alone, so any
diminution of accountability might be of less worry there.
Secondly, the creation of independent agencies operating at arms-length
through a contractual or quasi-contractual basis could lead to a problem of
political accountability. Transferring accountability to the private sector
through contracting or other mechanisms comes up against the fundamental
problem of differences between the sectors. Simply exchanging public
accountability for private is not necessarily going to solve the problems of
accountability. Governments may still be held to account even when there are
clear contractual arrangements or complete privatization. They may try to hide by
saying that the contractor or agency is responsible but this is unlikely to be
accepted by the public. Governments will be accountable for conflict over the
awarding of contracts and if contractors fail to deliver.