Joined-Up Governance

Abstract

How does the previous chapter on theories of public policy help us to make sense of recent administrative reforms? Once again my approach relies on the idea that the theories helped inspire the reforms. This approach suggests that we can better understand the reforms if we identify the intellectual traditions that led people to introduce them. More particularly, this chapter will argue that institutionalist approaches to the new governance lie behind the Third Way and joined-up government. The claim that social science informs administrative reforms may appear less plausible than the one that democratic theories inform constitutional reform. It would