This paper presents the results of a field investigation into the implementation of President Clinton's "reinventing government' initiative: the National Performance Review (NPR). We examine the efforts of six federal agencies and identify some specific points of tension that have arisen during implementation. The paper concludes that the evident lack of any theoretical coherence to the reforms and the corresponding inability to "tell what's false" have contributed to the development of these points of tension and are likely to present continuing problems to managers attempting to resolve the multiple competing objectives included in the NPR recommendations.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Bill, J. A.
, & Hardgrave, R. L. (1973). Comparative politics: The quest for theory. Columbus, OH: Charles E. Merrill Publishing Company.
2.
Clinton, W. J.
(1993). Streamlining the bureaucracy. Presidential memorandum, September 11.
3.
Denhardt, R. B.
(1993). The pursuit of significance: Strategies for managerial success in public organizations. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Company.
4.
Dilulio, J. J., Jr.
, Garvey, G., & Kettl, D. F. (1993). Improving government performance: An owner's manual. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution.
5.
Fesler, J. W.
(1957). Administrative literature and the second Hoover commission reports. American Political Science Review, 51 (March), 135-157.
6.
Goodsell, C. T.
(1993). Reinvent government or rediscover it?Public Administration Review, 53(1) (January/February), 85-86.
7.
Ingraham, P. W.
, & Ban, C. (Eds). Legislating bureaucratic change: The civil service reform act of 1978. Albany: State University of New York at Albany.
8.
Lan, Z.
, & Rosenbloom, D. H. (1992). Public administration in transition. Public Administration Review, 52(6) (November/December), 535-538.
9.
Light, P.
(1994). Partial quality management. Government Executive, 26 (4) 65-66.
10.
Moe, R. C.
(1992, March). Reorganizing the executive branch in the twentieth century: Landmark commissions. Report 92-93 GOV. Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service.
11.
Moe, R. C.
(1993). Let's rediscover government, not reinvent it. Government Executive, 25 (6) 46-49.
12.
Moe, R. C.
(1994). The "reinventing government" exercise: Misinterpreting the problem, misjudging the consequences. Public Administration Review, 54(2) (March/April), 111-122.
13.
National Partnership Council
. (1994, January). Report of the National Partnership Council.
14.
National Performance Review
. (1993, Sept. 7). From red tape to results: Creating a government that works better & costs less. Report of the National Performance Review led by Vice President Al Gore. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.
15.
National Performance Review
. (1994, Feb. 7). NPR customer service conference (held December 1993) (Internet).
16.
National Performance Review. (1994b, May 6). What is a reinvention lab? (Internet).
17.
Osborne, D.
, & Gaebler, T. (1992). Reinventing government: How the entrepreneurial spirit is transforming the public sectorNew York: Penguin Books USA, Inc.
18.
Overman, E. S.
, & Boyd, K. J. (1994). Best practice research and post-bureaucratic reform. Journal of Public Administration: Research and Theory, 4 (January), 67-83.
19.
Peters, B. G.
(1994). The public service, the changing state and governance. Paper prepared for the Canadian Centre for Management Development.
20.
Shoop, T.
(1993). Goring the bureaucracy. Government Executive, 25 (10), 12-16.
21.
Simon, H. A.
(1992). The proverbs of administration. In J. M. Shafritz & A. C. Hyde (Eds.), Classics of public administration, (pp. 150-165). Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole Publishing Company.
22.
Thompson, J. R.
, & Ingraham, P. W. (1993). Organizational redesign in the public sector: Theory and reality. Paper presented at the National Public Management Research Conference, Madison, WI, October.
