Institutional, Ideological and Political Influences on Local Government Contracting: Evidence From England

Alonso, José M.; Andrews, Rhys; Hodgkinson, Ian R.

doi:10.1111/padm.12216

Cited by 35 publications

(38 citation statements)

References 55 publications

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“…The coefficient for Labour political control is negative in all of the logit models but only reaches statistical significance for the model predicting ownership of companies limited by guarantee. Thus, left‐wing political control does not increase the likelihood of having no companies at all, but it is associated with ownership of at least one nonprofit entity—corroborating studies of the sectoral outsourcing preferences of left‐wing local governments (e.g., Alonso, Andrews, and Hodgkinson ) 8…”

Section: Statistical Resultssupporting

confidence: 67%

Corporatization in the Public Sector: Explaining the Growth of Local Government Companies

Andrews

Ferry

Skelcher

et al. 2019

Public Administration Review

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The creation of companies by local governments to provide public services-referred to as "corporatization"-is an example of systemic public entrepreneurship that is popular across the world. To build knowledge of the antecedents of public sector entrepreneurship, the authors investigate the factors that lead local governments to create companies for public service delivery. Using zero-inflated negative binomial regressions to analyze secondary data from 150 major English local governments for 2010-16, the authors find that governments with higher levels of grant dependence and debt dependence are more involved in the creation and operation of companies, as are larger governments. Further analysis reveals that very low and very high managerial capabilities are strongly associated with more involvement in profit-making companies, while local government involvement in companies is more prevalent in deprived areas. At the same time, government ownership of companies is more common in areas with high economic output. Evidence for Practice• In a context of budget cuts, grant dependence and debt dependence are leading local governments in England to corporatize service provision. • Local governments with low or high management capacity are motivated to create and control more companies, especially profit-making entities. • Systemic entrepreneurial activity within English local governments does not depend on left-wing or rightwing political control.

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Section: Statistical Resultssupporting

confidence: 67%

Corporatization in the Public Sector: Explaining the Growth of Local Government Companies

Andrews

Ferry

Skelcher

et al. 2019

Public Administration Review

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…In other words, with a well‐functioning provider market nearby, outsourcing is a more viable option for the local authority in question. Further, the application of the literature on institutional isomorphism to the contracting out by local authorities strongly suggests the presence of spatial dependency in the behaviour of English (Alonso et al ) and Danish (Villadsen et al ) municipalities due to mimetic isomorphism. The proximity effect of the neighbouring municipalities' outsourcing decisions is also clearly at play in the case of Swedish municipalities (Stolt and Winblad ).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Outsourcing, bureaucratic personnel quality and citizen satisfaction with public services

Dahlström

Nistotskaya

Tyrberg

2018

Public Administration

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This article investigates the relationships between outsourcing, bureaucratic personnel quality (BPQ) and citizen satisfaction with public services. Our baseline expectation is of a negative association between outsourcing and service quality; however, we argue that this tendency can be counteracted when the government buyer has a more competent and motivated personnel, not only in managerial positions, but across the board. Better‐educated and paid public employees are likely to have an important moderating effect on service quality through their input into quality specifications, their ability to recognize the provider's consummate or perfunctory behaviour, and their willingness to act on the observed performance. Using data from a cross‐section of Sweden's municipalities, our analysis reveals a robust association between higher levels of outsourcing and lower levels of citizen satisfaction, but the data do not provide unambiguous support for the hypothesis that the strength of this association diminishes when BPQ is higher.

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“…We also have strong theoretical reasons for assuming that our instrument is not correlated with recycling performance residuals after controlling for other covariates. Spatial dependence in local policy decisions is often driven by isomorphic pressures to adopt practices regarded as legitimate, rather than by efficiency-related considerations (Alonso, Andrews, & Hodgkinson, 2016;Bivand & Szymansky, 2000).…”

Section: Moderator Covariatesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Governance by targets and the performance of cross‐sector partnerships: Do partner diversity and partnership capabilities matter?

Alonso

Andrews

2018

Strategic Management Journal

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Research Summary: This study examines the effectiveness of targets as a tool for the contractual governance of cross‐sector partnerships. Applying a difference‐in‐differences methodology, we find that the use of explicit targets within performance contracts is an effective means for improving partnership outcomes, especially where partner diversity and partnership capabilities are high. Furthermore, we find evidence that target intensity is associated with stronger partnership performance. These findings suggest that contractual forms with explicit targets may be a particularly successful approach for enhancing the public value created by cross‐sector partnerships. A downward turn in performance following the removal of targets lends further support to this conclusion. Managerial Summary: Cross‐sector partnerships have become a vital means for creating value in pursuit of the public interest. In particular, the effective management of these partnerships is thought to hold the key to addressing the strategic and organizational challenges posed by major social and environmental issues, such as big data and climate change. In this article, we combine data on waste recycling from 2003 to 2014 with information on performance contracts between local cross‐sector partnerships and higher levels of government in England to quantify the impact of governance by targets on the performance of those partnerships. The benefits of target‐setting for partnership performance that we identify are even stronger when partner diversity is high and partnership capabilities are strong. We discuss the managerial and policy implications of our findings.

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Institutional, Ideological and Political Influences on Local Government Contracting: Evidence From England

Cited by 35 publications

References 55 publications

Corporatization in the Public Sector: Explaining the Growth of Local Government Companies

Corporatization in the Public Sector: Explaining the Growth of Local Government Companies

Outsourcing, bureaucratic personnel quality and citizen satisfaction with public services

Governance by targets and the performance of cross‐sector partnerships: Do partner diversity and partnership capabilities matter?

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