THE PUBLICNESS OF PUBLIC ORGANIZATIONS

This article analyses the diversity of public organizations focusing o n variations in their degree of publicness. We define 'publicness' as organizational attachment to public sector values: for example, due pr ocess, accountability, and welfare provision. Based on a survey of Dan ish public organizations, we show that organizations with a high degre e of publicness differ from organizations with a low degree of publicn ess. The former are characterized by complex tasks, professional orien tation, many external stakeholders, conflicting environmental demands, and low managerial autonomy. The latter are the opposite. We explore in detail both the relationship between the organizations and their pa rent ministries and their responses to organizational change. Organiza tions with a high degree of publicness are subject to a tight minister ial control and have formal and distant relations with the ministry. T hey also have strong vertical links, externally and internally. High i nternal control is the joint product of ministerial control and the st ress on the public sector value of rule compliance. All organizations ranked high on publicness are reluctant to adopt organizational change s stemming from the 'New Public Management'. Again, organizations with a low degree of publicness are the opposite, keen to adopt new ideas. We show that degree of publicness matters, across both functional typ es of organizations and policy sectors. Finally, we discuss alternativ e theoretical explanations of publicness drawn from contingency theory and the new institutionalism.