Bandwagoning municipal enterprises: institutional isomorphism and the search for the Third Way

Tomi Kallio and Päivikki Kuoppakangas

Policy Studies, 2013, vol. 34, issue 1, 19-35

Abstract: During the last decade, the number of municipal enterprises in Finland has almost tripled. This paper attempts to understand the phenomenon related to the recent mushrooming of municipal enterprises. This is done by three empirical case analyses of university hospital laboratories. In two of the three case organisations, there is very little indication that any strategy or other rational reasoning would explain the adoption of municipal enterprise form, and the analysis suggests that institutional isomorphism plays an essential role in the adoption of the municipal enterprise form. Moreover, there are signs that the search for the ‘Third Way’ of some local politicians, especially in the case of some early mover organisations, like the third case organisation of this study, might have triggered the development which has led to the bandwagon effect. The popularity of New Public Management (NPM) and the promises of the NPM mantra, suggesting, e.g. efficiency, cost-effectiveness and more flexible management, might lead the public administration decision-makers to believe in the superiority of certain business-like organisational forms. However, the decision-makers themselves might be surprised to learn how thin the evidence to back up the expectations concerning NPM reforms might be. The organisational transformation, such as the adoption of the municipal enterprise form, might lead to an outcome where public organisations become increasingly similar without necessarily becoming more efficient.

Date: 2013
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/01442872.2012.731842 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:cposxx:v:34:y:2013:i:1:p:19-35

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/cpos20

DOI: 10.1080/01442872.2012.731842

Access Statistics for this article

Policy Studies is currently edited by Toby James

More articles in Policy Studies from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().