'Leaderism' : an evolution of managerialism in UK public service reform

O'Reilly, D and Reed, Mike (2010) 'Leaderism' : an evolution of managerialism in UK public service reform. Public Administration: An International Quarterly, 88 (4). pp. 960-978. ISSN 0033-3298

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Abstract

This paper argues that ‘leaderism’– as an emerging set of beliefs that frames and justifies certain innovatory changes in contemporary organizational and managerial practice – is a development of managerialism that has been utilized and applied within the policy discourse of public service reform in the UK. The paper suggests that ‘leaderism’ is an evolution of entrepreneurial and cultural management ideologies and practices. An analysis of the articulation of leaderism with public service reform in the UK is presented. The paper problematizes the construals of leadership contained within these texts and reflects on their promotion of leadership as a social and organizational technology. ‘Leaderism’ is argued to be a complementary set of discourses, metaphors and practices to those of managerialism, which is being utilized in support of the evolution of NPM and new public governance approaches in the re-orientation of the public services towards the consumer-citizen.

Item Type:
Journal Article
Journal or Publication Title:
Public Administration: An International Quarterly
Uncontrolled Keywords:
/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/3300/3321
Subjects:
?? public administrationsociology and political sciencediscipline-based research ??
ID Code:
45450
Deposited By:
Deposited On:
11 Jul 2011 18:32
Refereed?:
Yes
Published?:
Published
Last Modified:
29 Feb 2024 00:41