Commodification or Transformation? Measuring performance in the public sector

Abstract

Currently managerial reforms in the UK public sector focus on performance measurement aimed at increasing accountability, value for money and the use of scarce resources. Through examination of this process in the National Health Service and higher education, this paper argues that this represents the imposition of private sector management practices and, therefore, represents further commodification of public sector services. The most likely outcome of these changes is not transformation of performance but deprofessionalisation of public sector workers.

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