Reform, hybridization, and revival: the status of new public management in Australia and New Zealand

ABSTRACT

This paper addresses the degree to which new public management (NPM) has continued to be an influential model for central government reform in Australia and New Zealand, two early adopters and exemplars of NPM. We analyse recent reform agendas and their impact on NPM in both countries. Several institutional and other types of explanations are provided for why NPM is retained, modified, or revived. NPM systems may resist or be diluted by new layers, or the incorporation of techniques and approaches from reform menus, producing revival, discontinuity and forms of hybridization.

KEYWORDS:

• New public management
• new public governance
• New Zealand
• Australia
• public administration reform

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author (s).

Notes

1. The Coalition has consisted of two parties, Liberal (urban centred) and National (rural based).

2. In New Zealand legislation, stewardship is defined as ‘proactively’ promoting the public service’s ‘longterm capability and its people’; ‘institutional knowledge and information’ systems and processes’; ‘assets’; and ‘legislation’.