Performance pledges-power to the consumer or a quagmire in public service legitimation?
By: CHEUNG, Anthony B. L
.
Material type: 
ArticlePublisher: New York : Marcel Dekker, 1996International Journal of Public Administration - IJPA 19, 2, p. 233-259Abstract: One of the latest initiatives in Hong Kong's public sector reform is the launch of performance pledges in 1992, which have essentially been modelled on citizen's charters in the United Kingdom. While the stated aims of performance pledges, citizen's charters, or similar initiatives, are to raise the standard of public services and to make such services answer better to the needs of ordinary people, hence empowering the public service consumers, this latest consumerist trend in public management has more far-reaching implications, both in terms of the organization as well as the legitimation of public service provision. This article examines such implications, with specific reference to the Hong Kong situation, and argues that the outcome of the development seems to point to the empowerment of public managers rather than the consumers as the official rhetoric would imply.
One of the latest initiatives in Hong Kong's public sector reform is the launch of performance pledges in 1992, which have essentially been modelled on citizen's charters in the United Kingdom. While the stated aims of performance pledges, citizen's charters, or similar initiatives, are to raise the standard of public services and to make such services answer better to the needs of ordinary people, hence empowering the public service consumers, this latest consumerist trend in public management has more far-reaching implications, both in terms of the organization as well as the legitimation of public service provision. This article examines such implications, with specific reference to the Hong Kong situation, and argues that the outcome of the development seems to point to the empowerment of public managers rather than the consumers as the official rhetoric would imply.
Click on an image to view it in the image viewer
There are no comments for this item.