The new managerialism in local governance: North-South dimensions

In recent times, a wave of public sector reforms has swept through develope d, developing and transitional countries, prompting observers to herald the emergence of a 'new public management revolution'. However, this tendency, while evident across a range of nations, both North and South, is a comple x, highly uneven and contradictory process. Indeed, we concur with, and see k to develop, the point by Polidano, who notes that it can 'be argued that such a thing as a unified coherent new public management model exists only in concept'. Subsequently, the paper is divided into two main parts. The fi rst provides a brief overview of the broader purported changes in local gov ernance by outlining aspects of Clarke and Newman's thesis concerning the m anagerialisation of local government. Thereafter, we consider some of the k ey determinants of, and contradictions within, transitions to the new manag erialism in two contrasting contexts, the UK and India. In doing so, we see k to highlight the importance of transitions in governance structures not a s some end state but as a complex of interrelated processes which interconn ect, as Dicken et al. suggest, 'in a complex and contingent fashion with ex tant (historically and geographically specific)' socio-institutional, econo mic, and political structures.