Public value creation versus co-production in local governance: The politics of theorising in contemporary public sector management

Public value creation and co-production can both accurately be characterised as comparatively new, although by now firmly established, ‘steering concepts’ in contemporary public sector management when set against the... [ view full abstract ]

Public value creation and co-production can both accurately be characterised as comparatively new, although by now firmly established, ‘steering concepts’ in contemporary public sector management when set against the normative concepts of (stylised; ideal-type) traditional bureaucracy and New Public Management. Both public value creation and co-production are built upon bases of substantial theory – which have nevertheless been characterised by healthy volumes of conjecture and refutation – and what,  by now, are  significant traditions of empirical work that inter alia have investigated the phenomena in various polities across the globe, in either case-study form or, alternatively, comparatively. Moreover, if we recognise the intrinsic parameters of local governance, in that its activities are necessarily limited in the domains of both the security and redistributive functions of governance writ large, but are comparatively broad in terms of allocative functions (where risk ultimately falls to higher tiers of governance) the potential for the application of both public value approaches and co-creation appear expansive indeed. However, the view that public value creation on the one hand and co-production on the other can happily co-exist, in both theory and practice, particularly at sub-national and local levels, is misplaced. This paper seeks to demonstrate that the core of public value creation centres on a reinvigorated defence of public management and value creation as assessed and measured by public officials, while alternatively the core of co-production centres on citizen-centred value creation. Tensions between the two, and paths of reconciliation are explored.