The Legacy of the New Public Management in Developing Countries

Abstract

Introduction ‘New Public Management’ is now a somewhat dated label. It was always a complex and far from consistent set of ideas, and from the first spotting of the trend it was often derided as a useful model for developing countries to follow. The conflicting mix of suspicion and enthusiasm that surrounded the NPM debate in the 1980s and early 1990s (see, for example, Spann, 1981; Osborne and Gaebler 1992) gave way to a more thoughtful skepticism in the late 1990s about its generalized applicability (Schick, 1998; Allen, 1999; Sutch, 1999). Probably, doubt has now won out. It is certainly commonplace for weary consultants and development agency staff to maintain that there is little in the NPM technical/ managerial amalgam that is appropriate for the politicized public sectors in many developing countries. After over 20 years of living with NPM, we should be able to address three substantial questions. The first key question is: Has NPM become the way of thinking about public management in developing, and developed, countries? NPM made some big claims, both about its effectiveness in improving government performance and about its inevitable dominance as a school of managerial thought. Did NPM win in its battle with the old public management approaches? Second, whether or not it removed other possibilities, to the extent that it was implemented did NPM work? Did it deliver on its promises to improve operational efficiency and the responsiveness of bureaucratic agents to their political principals? Finally, did it win enough, and did it work enough, to matter? Overall, what is the legacy of NPM — in a fashion-prone industry does it stand out from the other relatively minor twists and turns of public management? This article argues that the victory of NPM was very partial. It changed the debate but did not silence other public management voices and certainly did not take us to the end of managerial history. In looking at whether it worked, we are