Essay Review: New Public Management in New Zealand: The Past, Present and Future

Abstract

Almost three decades ago, the world of Public Policy and Administration (PPA) was rocked by New Public Management (NPM), a liberal gospel advocating the application of business administration models to the management of public services in lieu of the old ‘monolithic” and hierarchical neo-weberian ideal type. But nowhere than in the “Land of the Long White Cloud”, did NPM find a more fertile ground (Pollitt and Bouckaert 2004, Ryan and Gill 2011: 306). To quote Evert Lindquist, while the UK only took new “steps” and the US set on “re-inventing” its machinery of government, New Zealand launched a “revolution” (2011: pp. 46-84). Praised and flaunted around the world by the Bretton Woods Institutions, the country became known as the “Land of New Public Management” and Wellington, its capital, a site of pilgrimage for government practitioners seeking advice (Schick 1998: 123).

Since then, to paraphrase Castles et al., the “Great Experiment” has continued to fascinate. But while we know the fine grain of this “bureaucratic phenomenon”, its broader picture especially after the mid-1990s is still unclear. In the words of Berman, “Generalizable links among their findings remain sparse and thin” (2001: 231). This review article attempts to connect the dots by analyzing four books that offer an in-depth account of the reform program but were published at different time-distances.

The first, Public Management: The New Zealand Model dates from 1996, shortly after the virtual end of the experiment and was written by a team of academics led by Jonathan Boston, a keen observer of public policy in New Zealand. The second, Remaking New Zealand and Australian Economic Policy by Shaun Goldfinch, another academic was published in 2000 and is cast in a comparative perspective. The third, Public Management in New Zealand: Lessons and Challenges was published in 2001 by an insider, Graham Scott, the Secretary General of the powerful New Zealand Treasury from 1986 to 1993. The fourth, Future State, Directions for Public Management in New Zealand was published in 2011 and co-edited by Bill Ryan and Derek Gill. It recoups ideas from academics and policy practitioners who were asked by the State Services Commission, a public service watchdog to conceptualize the future state in a context marked by financial cuts, demands for more democratic accountability and complex challenges.

The books are reviewed along four dimensions: policy change, policy content, policy outcomes and future trends. Relevant questions are: Where did the reforms originate? What are their characteristics (defining and secondary)? How successful was the model? What is its current state and the path laying ahead? The books are cross-referred and where necessary supplemented by additional literature.