Accountability and Hybridity in Welfare Governance

Abstract

Hybridity has become a central characteristic of accountability in current public governance, particularly in the realm of social services. Contemporary service delivery systems are increasingly defined by the mixing and layering of accountability regimes with actors (both public and private) operating in multiple, overlapping, and at times conflicting accountability relations. The symposium aims to advance our understanding of this still under-research area by theorizing and empirically investigating hybrid arrangements of accountability. In this introductory article, we suggest a definition for what hybridity means in the context of accountability and explore the origins and development of hybrid accountability in current welfare institutions. We then present the contribution of the symposium papers against the background of the existing scholarly debate.We conclude by reflecting on the challenges of studying hybrid accountability and suggesting future lines of research in this field.

Governing education in times of crisis: State interventions and school accountabilities during the COVID-19 pandemic

“…The mixing and layering of accountabilities occurs when (a) two or more regimes are applied to an education system simultaneously; and (b) new logics are layered over pre-existing ones (Benish, 2020;Benish and Mattei, 2020). For instance, in England and Italy, systems of New Public Management (NPM) have imported the market logics of managerialism and consumerism into public education through open enrolment, teachers' performance-related pay, and the publication of performance league tables and inspection reports (Checchi and Mattei, forthcoming;Marsden, 2015;West et al, 2011).…”

“…Ultimately, the legal requirement for educational provision ensured a degree of constancy in the accountable relations across the three cases. Interpreted through the Benish (2020) framework, the prevalence of administrative and legal logics -namely, the implementation of public policy through formal and hierarchical processes and respect for the students' human rights (to education, healthy food and social protection) -could be said to reinforce the public accountability regime, upheld by professional values and goals related to clients' needs and care (see also Benish and Mattei, 2020).…”

“…Within such relational social systems, in which various actors collaborate and/or compete over policy directions, public education is delivered under increasingly hybrid accountability regimes, each with their own underlying institutional logics, goals, values and steering mechanisms. Thus, while the state acts as primus inter pares (first among equals) (Jessop, 2016), educators must provide targeted ex-post accounts of their actions to diverse social actors at distinct times (Benish, 2020;Benish and Mattei, 2020).…”

Views from Below: Inspectors’ Coping with Hybrid Accountabilities

“…providers of public services are held accountable through competition, professional norms, and the hierarchical interventions of regulatory agencies. Often there is not only one but several regulatory agencies to which service providers have to render account (Benish and Mattei 2019;Levi-Faur 2005), and often the accountability obligations of the different regulatory agencies are in conflict. It may even be possible for one regulatory agency to have accountability obligations that are themselves hybrid.…”

“…The rise of the regulatory (welfare) state has fueled an intense debate about accountability. While there were strong concerns about declining accountability in the early years of the regulatory welfare state, particularly with respect to public and democratic accountability, it is today widely accepted in the literature that accountability in regulation is not a question of more or less accountability but of multiple accountabilities and the relationships among them (Benish and Mattei 2019). This is where the literature on hybridity comes in, which acknowledges that accountability in regulation is multifaceted, fluid, and-as a rule-full of tensions.…”