Just how new is best value?

This article compares Best Value, the performance measurement framework pre sently being introduced in local government in the UK, with Planning and Pr ogramming Budgeting Systems (PPBS) and Zero Base Budgeting (ZBB). PPBS and ZBB are resource allocation techniques which became popular in the 1960s an d 1970s, but later declined in popularity. It appears that there is much of PPBS and ZBB in the Best Value framework. There may be a lot to learn from the past, and many issues to be addressed, if Best Value is not to suffer the same fate as PPBS and ZBB.