Performing governance: A partnership board dramaturgy

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Freeman, Tim; Peck, Edward
• 署名单位: University of Birmingham
• 刊物名称: PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0033-3298
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9299.2007.00683.x
• 发表日期: 2007
• 页码: 907-929
• 关键词: institutionalism; strategy; POLICY

摘要

This paper explores the governance of complex public sector partnerships through a detailed case study of a Joint Commissioning Partnership Board (JCPB) in the South East of England. It argues that a theoretical and empirical focus on the instrumental roles of boards has resulted in an under-appreciation of their symbolic purposes, especially in the context of the governance of inter-organizational relationships. The paper considers the performative dimension of partnership governance, highlighting the role of the symbolic in institutional enactment. Following a brief overview of governance in public sector partnerships, the case study site for the empirical research is introduced. The instrumental and symbolic roles of management boards are considered from a new institutionalist perspective and a dramaturgical analysis of institutional enactment undertaken to explore interplays of the symbolic and instrumental in strategy formation. Some implications for our understanding of the symbolic in partnership governance are discussed.