Political management and local performance: a testing relationship

John Fenwick, Karen Johnston

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    Abstract

    Purpose
    – Reform of local political management continues to be part of the international agenda for change as governments seek to create the conditions for better performance in local government. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of changes in political management upon the performance of local government, with England as a case study, and the implications for local government reform elsewhere.

    Design/methodology/approach
    – Using statistical data derived from the system of comprehensive performance assessment (CPA), the analysis uses Kendall's tau to correlate CPA score per local authority against the respective political governance arrangement of each local authority in England.

    Findings
    – As the correlation coefficient did not reach the level of statistical significance, the principal finding is that the relationship between different political governance arrangements and local authorities' performance is not demonstrated. The implications of this for governments' reforms of political management are discussed.

    Research limitations/implications
    – The data are based upon English sources and point to the importance of conducting comparable analysis in other societies that have undergone similar changes in local political management.

    Practical implications
    – In instituting reforms of local governance, governments rarely pay serious attention to measurable outcomes and the paper suggests the value in so doing.

    Originality/value
    – The specific relationship between local political management and performance has not previously been measured in precisely this way.
    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)221-230
    Number of pages9
    JournalThe International Journal of Public Sector Management
    Volume25
    Issue number3
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2012

    Keywords

    • local governance
    • performance
    • political management
    • local government
    • performance (public administration)
    • United Kingdom
    • public sector reform
    • change management

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