The Transformation of Work in Welfare State Organizations: New Public Management and the Institutional Diffusion of Ideas

How has New Public Management influenced social policy reform in different developed welfare states? New managerialism is conceptualized as a paradigm, which not only shapes the decision-making process in bureaucratic organizations but also affects the practice of individuals (citizens).

Public administrations have been expected to transform from traditional bureaucratic organizations into modern managerial service providers by adopting a business model that requires the efficient and effective use of resources. The introduction of managerial practices, controlling and accounting systems, management by objectives, computerization, service orientation, increased outsourcing, competitive structures and decentralized responsibility are typical of efforts to increase efficiency. These developments have been accompanied by the abolition of civil service systems and fewer secure jobs in public administrations.

This book provides a sociological understanding of how public administrations deal with this transformation, how people’s role as public servants is affected, and what kind of strategies emerge either to meet these new organizational requirements or to circumvent them. It shows how hybrid arrangements of public services are created between the public and the private sphere that lead to conflicts of interest between private strategies and public tasks as well as to increasingly homogeneous social welfare provision across Europe.

Frank Sowa is professor of sociology at University of Applied Sciences Georg Simon Ohm in Nuremberg, Germany. He received his Ph.D. degree from the University Erlangen-Nuremberg and worked as senior researcher at the Institute for Employment Research (IAB). He is a sociologist specialized in qualitative and ethnographic methods. His past experiences have drawn his interest in organizational ethnography of public employment services, trends of globalisation of social policy, New Public Management as well as identity politics of the Greenlandic Inuit.

Ronald Staples is post-doctoral researcher at the Institute of Sociology at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany. Before taking up his studies of Sociology and Theatre- and Mediastudies he was a professional theatre actor. Main research focus is on Organizations, Bureaucracy, Innovation and Digitization. He published recently a book on the relationship of Innovation and Organisations: "Doing Innovation" (2017), Springer VS and coedited a volume dealing with interaction and digitization: "Leib und Netz" (2018), Springer VS.

Stefan Zapfel studied sociology and political sciences at the University of Vienna. He is a researcher and assistant managing director at the Institute for Empirical Sociology at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg. His work especially focuses on labour market research, social security systems, vocational rehabilitation, and inclusion of people with disabilities.