Publics, Politics and Power: Remaking the Public in Public Services

Abstract

This is an exciting time to be writing this book. Discussions of publicness and the public sphere have tended to be preoccupied with narratives of decline: public services being privatised, state funding squeezed, public culture debased, politics corrupted, and so on. Underpinning such narratives is a fundamental assumption that any wider sensibility of public connectedness and public action is in retreat in the face of the growing power of markets, individualism and consumerism. The fortunes of the state, the institutions of the public sector, and the public itself are thus deeply

Youth sport volunteers in England: A paradox between reducing the state and promoting a Big Society

“…A further criticism of the Big Society concept (not addressed in this paper) is that the civic activism it engenders is always within parameters that preclude challenging the state itself (Newman and Clarke, 2009) and that partnerships between the voluntary sector and state "have become increasingly compulsory…" (p. 60) as a means to accessing state resources. This is relevant to sports clubs and NGBs because of the tension between their acceptance of support from local and national government, and retaining their independence (Grix & Phillpots, 2011;Houlihan & White, 2002).…”

Vanhuspalvelut ja valinnanvapaus - johtavien viranomaisten näkemyksiä palvelusetelistä

“…Aina ei kuitenkaan ole itsestään selvää, että valinnanvapaus todella toteutuu niin, että ihmiset pystyvät valitsemaan itselleen parhaan palvelun (Greve 2009). Valintojen tekeminen edellyttää kykyä toimia kuluttajana eli määritellä tarpeet, hankkia tietoa ja vertailla vaihtoehtoja, valita palveluntuottaja ja vaihtaa se tarvittaessa, ja lopulta saada palvelun avulla täytettyä ne tarpeet, joita varten palvelu hankittiin (Newman & Clarke 2009;Newman & Tonkens 2011, 10-11).…”

Governing welfare reform symbolically: evidence based or iconic policy?

“…However, as Newman and Clarke (2009) demonstrate, implementing welfare reform happens unevenly in contradictory and contested situations, rather than being determined via a hierarchical, controlled, linear, rational process. The artifacts that appear here symbolize what Bang has termed -culture governance‖ and but what could otherwise be termed -spin‖ (Gewirtz et al, 2004) or governmentality (Rose 1989).…”

“…The idea came about as a means of engaging local children and their families in a fun activity that could also achieve educational and -social inclusion‖ goals. What I have termed the -elastic-policy-project‖ (Carter 2009) enabled a range of diverse partners which included people from a further education college, a voluntary run out of school club, a housing regeneration agency, a youth worker and so on to assemble (Newman and Clarke 2009) mutual objectives and simultaneously articulate their own policy agendas and to translate these into a uniquely local project that manifested as an unintended outcome of centrally determined policy. The creative circus idea seemed a long way from a discourse of managerialist evidence based policy with its insistence on delivering efficient, strategic outcomes.…”