Public value, governance and third way

Abstract

In the public debate there is a couple of concepts that seem to dominate the landscape. It means, they apparently do not permit the presence of other member on the ground: Welfare State and Minimal State. Each of them has a specific administrative model: The Welfare State corresponds to the Traditional Public Administration (TPA); the Minimal State corresponds to New Public Administration (NPM). In addition, on the one hand, the interventionist model had a strong theoretical background with the complex of social-democrat ideas. On the other hand, the libertarian model has had a powerful system of ideas. This paper challenges the perception that there is just one binomial of models. In contrast, there is a Third Way which in the administrative dimension corresponds to governance through community networks. And they both have, as I will show, a heavy support of ideas.