In their 1990 book Impossible Jobs in Public Management, Erwin C. Hargrove and John C. Glidewell argue that public agencies with limited legitimacy, high conflict, low professional authority, and weak agency myths have essentially impossible jobs. Yet some such positions have proven operationally possible. For example, over a 17‐year period, the New York City Police Department achieved dramatic reductions in crime. A second impossible job discussed by James Q. Wilson, the urban school superintendent, has also proven possible, with Washington, D.C., having considerable success educating disadvantaged children. However, these successes in urban crime control and public schooling have not been widely copied. Building on the work of Manuel P. Teodoro, the authors use these cases to discuss how the inflexibility of personnel systems and political costs of disruptive reforms combine with the professional norms and progressive ambition of agency leaders to limit the diffusion of innovations in law enforcement and schooling. The article concludes with hypotheses for future testing.
How do district schools respond to competition from charter schools? To explore this question, we examine four small Arizona school districts which lost from a tenth to a third of enrollment to charter schools in a short time period. Districts lost market share to charter schools because they did not satisfy significant constituencies, thus providing demands for education alternatives. District responses to market pressure depend on overall enrollment trends, the quality of the charter competition, the quality of district leadership, and the size of the district. Districts respond to competition in various ways, including reforming curricula, changing leadership, vilifying charter competitors, and attempting to absorb those competitors. Responses suggest that competition improves schools, but that markets do not work quickly or without friction and must be understood in context.
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