IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/euract/v10y2001i3p523-543.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Transforming the public sector: management consultants as agents of change

Author

Listed:
  • Irvine Lapsley
  • Rosie Oldfield

Abstract

This paper examines the practices of a distinctive group of change agents in the reform of the UK public sector - management consultants. The involvement of management consultants in these reforms has been the subject of intense debate. There have been attempts to present management consultants as 'rational modernizers', on the one hand and attempts to demonize them, on the other. However, little is known about the practices of management consultants in the public sector. This paper seeks to shed light on the management consultant as change agent in the UK public sector. The primary source of evidence is the perceptions of management consultants who have advised public sector institutions.

Suggested Citation

  • Irvine Lapsley & Rosie Oldfield, 2001. "Transforming the public sector: management consultants as agents of change," European Accounting Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 10(3), pages 523-543.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:euract:v:10:y:2001:i:3:p:523-543
    DOI: 10.1080/713764628
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/713764628
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/713764628?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Brian P. Bloomfield & Ardha Danieli, 1995. "The Role Of Management Consultants In The Development Of Information Technology: The Indissoluble Nature Of Socio‐Political And Technical Skills," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(1), pages 23-46, January.
    2. Robin Fincham, 1999. "The Consultant–Client Relationship: Critical Perspectives on the Management of Organizational Change," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(3), pages 335-351, May.
    3. Williams, Alan, 1972. "Cost-benefit analysis: Bastard science? and/or insidious poison in the body politick?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 1(2), pages 199-225, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Helen Irvine, 2007. "Corporate Creep: An Institutional View Of Consultancies in a Non-Profit Organisation," Australian Accounting Review, CPA Australia, vol. 17(41), pages 13-25, March.
    2. Jupe, Robert & Funnell, Warwick, 2015. "Neoliberalism, consultants and the privatisation of public policy formulation: The case of Britain's rail industry," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 65-85.
    3. Christensen, Mark & Skærbæk, Peter, 2010. "Consultancy outputs and the purification of accounting technologies," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 35(5), pages 524-545, July.
    4. Kevin Baird, 2007. "Adoption of activity management practices in public sector organizations," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 47(4), pages 551-569, December.
    5. Momani Bessma, 2013. "Management consultants and the United States’ public sector," Business and Politics, De Gruyter, vol. 15(3), pages 381-399, October.
    6. Mark Christensen, 2003. "Without `Reinventing the Wheel‘: Business Accounting Applied to the Public Sector," Australian Accounting Review, CPA Australia, vol. 13(30), pages 22-27, July.
    7. Laura Girella, 2013. "Regulating through the "Logic of Appropriateness" and the "Rhetoric of the Expert": The Role of Consultants in the Case of Intangibles Reporting in Germany," FINANCIAL REPORTING, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2013(3-4), pages 75-109.
    8. Pemer, Frida & Börjeson, Love & Werr, Andreas, 2014. "Government agencies’ use of management consulting services in Sweden – an explorative study," SSE Working Paper Series in Business Administration 2014:3, Stockholm School of Economics.
    9. P. Windels & J. Christiaens, 2007. "The Adoption Of Accrual Accounting In Flemish Public Centres For Social Welfare: Examining The Importance Of Agents Of Change," Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium 07/451, Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.
    10. Ramadhan, Sayel, 2009. "Budgetary accounting and reporting practices in Bahraini governmental units: An empirical study," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 168-183, April.
    11. Christensen, Mark & Newberry, Susan & Potter, Bradley N., 2019. "Enabling global accounting change: Epistemic communities and the creation of a ‘more business-like’ public sector," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 53-76.
    12. Peña-Miguel, Noemí & De La Peña, Joseba Iñaki, 2018. "New accounting information system: An application for a basic social benefit in Spain," Revista de Contabilidad - Spanish Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 28-37.
    13. Sahar Mohammad Abu Bakir, 2017. "The Influence of Strategic Leadership on Building Employees’ Entrepreneurial Orientation: A Field Study at the Jordanian Public Sector," International Business Research, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 10(6), pages 62-74, June.
    14. Sandra Cohen & Sotirios Karatzimas, 2016. "Modernizing government accounting standards in Greece: a case of ‘garbage can’ decision-making," Public Money & Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(3), pages 173-180, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Helen Irvine, 2007. "Corporate Creep: An Institutional View Of Consultancies in a Non-Profit Organisation," Australian Accounting Review, CPA Australia, vol. 17(41), pages 13-25, March.
    2. Heusinkveld, Stefan & Visscher, Klaasjan, 2012. "Practice what you preach: How consultants frame management concepts as enacted practice," Scandinavian Journal of Management, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 285-297.
    3. Alessandro Fedele & Andrea Mantovani, 2010. "The Importance of Being Consulted," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 11(2), pages 231-245, November.
    4. Stefan Henningsson & Christian Øhrgaard, 2016. "IT Consultants in Acquisition IT Integration," Business & Information Systems Engineering: The International Journal of WIRTSCHAFTSINFORMATIK, Springer;Gesellschaft für Informatik e.V. (GI), vol. 58(3), pages 193-212, May.
    5. Richard Cookson & Owen Cotton-Barrett & Matthew Adler & Miqdad Asaria & Toby Ord, 2016. "Years of good life based on income and health: Re-engineering cost-benefit analysis to examine policy impacts on wellbeing and distributive justice," Working Papers 132cherp, Centre for Health Economics, University of York.
    6. Anthony Culyer, 2009. "Deliberative Processes in Decisions about Health Care Technologies," Briefing 000231, Office of Health Economics.
    7. Quattrone, Paolo & Hopper, Trevor, 2005. "A 'time-space odyssey': management control systems in two multinational organisations," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 30(7-8), pages 735-764.
    8. Momani Bessma, 2013. "Management consultants and the United States’ public sector," Business and Politics, De Gruyter, vol. 15(3), pages 381-399, October.
    9. Pemer, Frida & Börjeson, Love & Werr, Andreas, 2014. "Government agencies’ use of management consulting services in Sweden – an explorative study," SSE Working Paper Series in Business Administration 2014:3, Stockholm School of Economics.
    10. Khoirul Aswar & Siti Zabedah Saidin, 2018. "The Influencing Factors On The Level Of Accrual Accounting Adoption: A Conceptual Approach," Romanian Economic Business Review, Romanian-American University, vol. 13(2), pages 30-36, June.
    11. James Mason & Martin Eccles & Nick Freemantle & Mike Drummond, 1998. "NICEly does it: economic analysis within evidence-based clinical practice guidelines," Working Papers 164chedp, Centre for Health Economics, University of York.
    12. Idris, Bochra & Saridakis, George, 2018. "Local formal interpersonal networks and SMEs internationalisation: Empirical evidence from the UK," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 610-624.
    13. Leiby, Justin, 2018. "The role of consultants and management prestige in management control system adoption," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 1-13.
    14. Walter Hettich, 1976. "Distribution in Benefit-Cost Analysis: A Review of Theoretical Issues," Public Finance Review, , vol. 4(2), pages 123-150, April.
    15. Alaric Bourgoin & Fabian Muniesa, 2012. "Making a consultancy slideshow 'rock solid': a study of pragmatic efficacy," Working Papers halshs-00702224, HAL.
    16. Pauline Jas, 2013. "The role of interim managers in performance improvement: evidence from English local authorities," Public Money & Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(1), pages 15-22, January.
    17. Keys, P., 1997. "Approaches to understanding the process of OR: Review, critique and extension," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 1-13, February.
    18. Kristof van Assche & Raoul Beunen & Stefan Verweij, 2020. "Comparative Planning Research, Learning, and Governance: The Benefits and Limitations of Learning Policy by Comparison," Urban Planning, Cogitatio Press, vol. 5(1), pages 11-21.
    19. Pemer, Frida & Werr, Andreas, 2005. "Between exploitation and control – Clients’ conceptions of the consultant-client relationship," SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Business Administration 2005:4, Stockholm School of Economics.
    20. Hartnett, Elizabeth J. & Daniel, Elizabeth M. & Holti, Richard, 2012. "Client and consultant engagement in public sector IS projects," International Journal of Information Management, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 307-317.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:euract:v:10:y:2001:i:3:p:523-543. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/REAR20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.