Moving Publicness Forward: Merging Moulton and Merritt’s Frameworks to Examine Managed Care Organizations

Abstract

Abstract Publicness work focuses on the unique characteristics that make an organization more, or less, public, and dates back to the late 70s. Despite the range of publicness research that exists, the characteristics explored remain largely unchanged. However, merging Merritt’s (2019) primary influences that make an organization public and Moulton’s (2009) realized publicness frameworks provides the structure necessary to explore a broader conceptualization of organizational publicness. This study pushes theory forward by considering aspects of publicness beyond political authority-specific characteristics and uses behavioral health managed care organizations (MCOs) as the tool for exploration. This work outlines propositions, offers metrics that can be used in future studies, and explores how the framework can be valuable and what it might reveal in organizational settings beyond MCOs.