The politics of third actors: strategies used by public participation professionals in their interactions with public forum sponsors

Bhérer, Laurence

doi:10.1080/03003930.2023.2169674

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 19 publications

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“…At the same time, local government entities have been restructured in different ways, with the wholesale introduction of unitary councils in the devolved nations but partial and episodic moves in the same direction in England (Goodwin et al, 2005;Gore, 2018). This divergence has been reflected by a stronger emphasis on central-local collaboration and participatory and deliberative approaches to governance in Scotland and Wales, compared with more transactional and conflictual interactions in England (Hay & Martin, 2014;Pike et al, 2016;Verhoeven et al, 2022;Bynner et al, 2023).…”

Section: Recent Trends In Uk Sub-national and Local Governmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Path Clearing, Policy Acceleration or Trend Reinforcement: Potential Implications of Selected Local Government Responses to Covid-19 in the UK

Gore,

Bimpson,

Dobson

et al. 2023

irpp

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Since its onset in 2020 Covid-19 impacts have engendered rapid interventions across all policy domains and at all scales of government. This has prompted lively debate around the wider significance and longer-term implications of such moves with regard to their role as potential 'punctuations' within a broader policy paradigm shift. This includes acting as a ‘path-clearing’ mechanism that heralds a move towards a different approach; representing the onset of ‘path deviation’ towards such a change; quickly adding to the implementation of new ideas in a process of 'policy acceleration’; or essentially replicating existing patterns to provide 'trend reinforcement'. This paper applies these concepts to a wide range of evidence on local government responses to Covid-19 across the United Kingdom (UK). The analysis focuses on five selected domains: supporting and coordinating mutual aid; maintaining local economies; addressing homelessness; managing parks and other public spaces; and promoting active travel through road space reallocation. Developments in each of these areas are framed by both wider operational and existing policy contexts, as well as with respect to geographical and sectoral variations. The conclusion is that evidence exists for all four types of 'punctuation', but the patterns are inconsistent both between and within different local authorities and policy domains.

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