Modernizing the Administration from the Left: Bureaucracy, New Public Management and Deliberative Administration

Debating with the New Public Management (NPM) theories is the central aim of the article. During the last two decades, the NPM approach has been the principal contribution to public sector modernization. Nevertheless, such contributions may be observed as too simplistic and biased ideologically. The first part of the article is concerned with defining and discussing the NPM. On one hand, we have identified two lines of the NPM development: the commitment with competitiveness (“macho” management) and the emphasis on quality and flexibility (soft management). On the other hand, the article also points out the weakness of the NPM, underlying both the non-intended consequences of competition when applied in the public domain, and the gap between theory and practice in implementing quality and flexibility. Finally, we conclude that most of the innovative promises of the NPM may be seen as misleading. There is not a real novelty, but an adaptation of the traditional model of public administration: new terms for a similar administration.

Using the critical diagnostic as a starting point, the second part of the article tries to built an alternative perspective on public sector modernization. The so-called Deliberative Public Administration (DPA) is, therefore, drawn as an approach which overcomes the triple-E obsession of the NPM (a traditional objective) and introduces a fresher concern on dialogue, communication and responsiveness (new objectives). It represents a move from an instrumental and narrow view of public administration to a substantive and wider one. In other terms, the NPM is concerned with doing things (internal focus), while the DPA would prefer to do the correct things (external focus). From our point of view, the complexities and diversities of our world are the principal arguments for the DPA. Therefore, we need -not only we wish- to modernize our administration with need ideas such as trust, dialogue, mediation, creativity, interactivity, or openness. NPM has been, in practice, just a cosmetic version of the old bureaucratic model, but we need a new administration for new times. That is the real challenge when discussing about public sector modernization.