Partnering for quality and performance: A standpoint for enhanced services

Abstract

This paper presents a case study of bus service delivery. It offers an original perspective on the governance of Public Transport (PT), buses in particular, and how it contributes to Quality and Performance that is the modal shift. To this purpose, the paper departs from the premise that traditional public management concepts, tools, and techniques are limited in practice, as they do not account for the context and subsequent complexities. This refers to the New Public Management (NPM) paradigm, which promotes competition for service delivery in order to foster efficiency, as well as contracting and distinct responsibilities between the Public Transport Authority (PTA) and the Public Transport Operator (PTO). Yet such a rationale is static in nature and overemphasises structures over processes. New Public Management does not capture the uncertainties of the dynamic and changing environment, nor the customer-led nature of Quality and Performance. Instead, this paper contends that modal shift depends on the capacity of multiple parties to build the future together and requires the creation of conditions for joint action and partnership. To better reflect such a standpoint, modal shift relies on recent developments from Governance and Network theories, combined with the constructs of Contract Theories to analyse the empirical materials.