Local government modernization: UK and comparative analysis from an organizational perspective

Hartley, Jean; Butler, Michael J. R. and Benington, John (2002). Local government modernization: UK and comparative analysis from an organizational perspective. Public Management Review, 4(3) pp. 387–404.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/14616670210151612

Abstract

This article analyses three strands of local government modernization. The first takes an overview of the development of ‘modernization’ and ‘improvement’ of local government in the UK under the Labour government since 1997 and the overall programme of reform. We discuss both the shifts and the continuities with the previous decade and a half of the ‘new public management’ of Conservative administrations. We examine the implicit as sumptions about how to achieve organizational and cultural change, arguing that much modernization is premised on a mechanistic metaphor of organizational change.
The second section of the article examines other metaphors and theories of organizational change, arguing for the need to cons ider institutional and organizational perspectives in analysing local government modernization. The third section of the article then applies some organizational concepts
to the comparative analysis of local government modernization.

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