Bureaucrats and Politicians in Britain

Wilson, Graham K.; Barker, Anthony

doi:10.1111/1468-0491.00220

Cited by 32 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…The simple provision of information to media outlets was not sufficient. A greater degree of proactive advocacy was expected (see Hennessy , 488–489; Wilson and Barker , 369).…”

Section: United Kingdommentioning

confidence: 99%

Responsibility to Be Enthusiastic? Public Servants and the Public Face of “Promiscuous Partisanship”

Grube

2014

Governance

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Contemporary public service leaders are no longer the anonymous mandarins of Westminster folklore. Whether giving public speeches to outside organizations or communicating directly with the media, senior public servants are emerging from anonymity to become public actors in their own right. This article undertakes a comparative study across four Westminster jurisdictions—Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom—to examine the formal rules and guidelines that apply to public servants when making public statements in their official capacity. Drawing on the late Peter Aucoin's notion of “promiscuous partisanship,” the article argues that public servants are expected to demonstrate a new level of enthusiasm when explaining or justifying government policy to the public. This has implications for the extent to which nonpartisanship can continue to effectively function within Westminster systems.

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“…The simple provision of information to media outlets was not sufficient. A greater degree of proactive advocacy was expected (see Hennessy , 488–489; Wilson and Barker , 369).…”

Section: United Kingdommentioning

confidence: 99%

Responsibility to Be Enthusiastic? Public Servants and the Public Face of “Promiscuous Partisanship”

Grube

2014

Governance

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“…The UK civil service historically had much in common with British professions; some scholars have gone as far as to argue that it is a profession in its own right (Campbell and Wilson 1995) or have come close to doing so (Silberman 1993; Bogdanor 2003). It has historically fulfilled most of the attributes commonly associated with professions: internal control over promotions, commitment for life, strong and distinctive ethical norms, and a culture born of intensive socialization beginning in specialist education (Heclo and Wildavsky 1974; Dargie and Locke 1999; Wilson and Barker 2003; Sausman and Locke 2007). Elite civil servants were key parts of ‘club government’, an ‘informal, oligarchic, and secretive’ approach to policy‐making that went with a high degree of self‐regulation (by professions, and the civil service, among others) and institutional stability (Marquand 1988; Moran 2003: 4).…”

Section: The Rise Of Managerialism In Uk Governmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

In the Eye of the Storm: Civil Servants and Managers in the UK Department of Health

Jarman

Greer

2010

Social Policy &Amp; Administration

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In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, the UK government faces some tough choices over public expenditure, and these choices will have important implications for both the future of health policy and the way in which health services are managed. In this article, we examine the organization and leadership of the UK Department of Health and weigh its suitability to meet such challenges. We find an organization that is culturally split between public servants and managers, highly reliant on the ability of its key personnel to bridge these divides, and extremely responsive to the political goals of government ministers. We explore the modern DH using three types of evidence. First, the history of the department shows clear political efforts to reduce civil service discretion and focus the DH on the management of the English NHS. Second, the recent organizational structures of the DH show a bifurcation between policy direction and NHS management tasks. Third, an analysis of the top ranks of the department since 2005 shows the implementation of political preferences that are consistent with managerialism but inconsistent with the perceived characteristics of traditional civil servants. The result is a department which has changed just as frequently as the health service it oversees -a department which has been moulded by successive ministers into one for the management of the NHS. Our findings raise important questions about the value and purpose of long-term organizational knowledge in policy formulation.

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“…For instance, despite intense struggles about the role of the public sector through the three decades (1970s–1990s), the American higher civil servants still remain a well‐educated, experienced, and highly motivated group, as they were in 1970 (Aberbach 2003b). In the United Kingdom, the civil service is still ideologically located in the center and appears to have moved away somewhat from Image III into the direction of Image I (Wilson and Barker 2003). German civil servants are still left of center (Derlien 2003).…”

Section: Findings In Apr and Changes Since Thenmentioning

confidence: 99%

Political‐Administrative Relations: Impact of and Puzzles in Aberbach, Putnam, and Rockman, 1981

Lee

Raadschelders

2008

Governance

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Political‐administrative relations became an issue once politicians and administrators came to be considered as distinct actors in the public realm. This happened in the late eighteenth century, and several authors since then explored the nature of this relationship in normative and/or juridical terms. But it took almost two centuries before it became an object of systematic empirical study in a comparative perspective: Aberbach, Putnam, and Rockman (APR 1981). The APR study was the first to use survey methods and to advance empirically based theory. In this article we discuss the intellectual attention for this topic since the early nineteenth century, APR's findings and impact and—given APR's influence upon methods—some intriguing problems with the framework that they developed. Finally we list some potential new avenues of research.

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Bureaucrats and Politicians in Britain

Cited by 32 publications

References 2 publications

Responsibility to Be Enthusiastic? Public Servants and the Public Face of “Promiscuous Partisanship”

Responsibility to Be Enthusiastic? Public Servants and the Public Face of “Promiscuous Partisanship”

In the Eye of the Storm: Civil Servants and Managers in the UK Department of Health

Political‐Administrative Relations: Impact of and Puzzles in Aberbach, Putnam, and Rockman, 1981

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