The Termination of Public Organizations: Theoretical Perspectives to Revitalize a Promising Research Area

Abstract

Termination, Public organizations, Policy termination, Administrative reform,

Coming to Terms with Termination of Public Organizations

“…Theoretically, the study of organizational termination used to be a subfield of the policy termination and policy cycle literature (DeLeon 1982). These literatures claim that the policies carried out by public organizations do not often come to a definite end (Adam et al 2007). In fact, public organizations and the policy programs they implement seem to be subject to constant structural reform, which blurs the distinction between termination or continuation in a dressed up (or down) version.…”

“…Starting with Herbert Kaufman's seminal Are Government Organizations Immortal? (1976), scholars on both sides of the Atlantic and beyond studied the transformation of government-including the survival of public organizations Hogwood 1988, 1991;Lewis 2002Lewis , 2004Carpenter and Lewis 2004;Adam et al 2007;Boin et al 2010Boin et al , 2016Rolland and Roness 2011;Park 2013;MacCarthaigh 2014;James et al 2015).…”

Reassessing the concept of policy termination: the case of regional policy in England

“…In the case of those policy elements that have been terminated, four of the facilitating conditions postulated almost three decades ago by Bardach (1976) and subsequently refined and reworked by others (Behn 1978;deLeon 1978a;Lewis 2002;Adam et al 2007;Bauer 2009) apply: a change in administration; delegitimation of the ideological matrix in which the policy is embedded; a period of turbulence that justifies discontinuing certain government activities; and cushioning the blow. The election of a new UK government in 2010, the resulting changed ideological stance towards government intervention, the effects of the financial and economic crisis and the introduction of local development structures and policy programmes fit with the Bardach hypothesis.…”

“…Using the more recent typology developed by Adam et al (2007) to explain organisational termination, the English case could be characterised as embodying 'high political incentives' and 'low organisational stickiness'. The RDAs' quasipublic status as relatively young, 'arms length' central government instruments operating in regions that lacked elected administrations deprived them of the institutional status to resist termination.…”

Frå stabilitet til turbulens. 70 år med organisasjonsendringar i departementa – politisk design eller institusjonell tilpasning?

“…Truleg er det mange drivkrefter i spel når organiseringa av det sentrale forvaltningsapparatet blir endra (Verhoest og Laegreid 20110;Adam, Knill og Studinger 2007), og vi kan ikkje utan vidare overføre erfaringar frå amerikansk presidentstyre til europeiske parlamentariske fleirpartisystem (Kuipers et al 2016). Vi må gå ut over ein-faktorforklaringar og sjå på samspelet mellom politiske val, kulturelle bindingar, og press frå omgivnadene for å forstå det mønsteret som avspeglar seg.…”