Market shaping: Understanding the role of non‐government actors in social care quasi‐market stewardship

Abstract

AbstractAs market‐based responses to social care have grown in popularity across the world, the need for good stewardship of social care quasi‐markets is increasingly becoming a concern for governments. The market stewardship literature has focused almost exclusively on the role of government and central agencies. However, non‐government actors also play an important role in shaping quasi‐markets. We examine the market stewardship activities being conducted by non‐government actors in the Australian National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS), a large social care quasi‐market. Results show a wide range of non‐government actors are conducting both direct and indirect stewardship activities that are actively shaping the NDIS market. These include activities focused on both the participant side of the market such as advocacy and information provision and on the provider side such as connecting consumers with services, assisting providers with regulatory and administrative requirements and marketing for providers. We argue that for effective stewardship of the NDIS these activities need to be acknowledged and supported by central government. For this to occur we suggest development of a framework for distributed stewardship using principles of joined up government working. Such a framework could help inform stewardship actions across different personalisation quasi‐markets.