Compare Public Management Reform in the UK with one other country of Essay

Compare Public Management Reform in the UK with one other country of your choice. What does the comparison tell you about the factors that shape public management in each country - Essay Example The objective is to understand deeper the specific circumstances confronted by each country in public sector management. The first, command and control, involves top-down management and asserts that government can take charge and â€Å"can be highly effective† (Barber 2007, p. 21). Two such examples of the â€Å"command and control† approach is the UK government’s National Literacy Strategy between 1997 and 2001 and the UK government’s reduction of health care waiting times between 2000 and 2005 (Barber 2007, p. 21). The â€Å"quasi-market† approach attempts to provide government services as how one may provide a service in the market wherein privatisation is an option (Barber 2007, p. 21-22). According to Barber (2007, p. 22), some of the good examples of the â€Å"quasi-market† market approach are as follows: (1) the Medicare program of the United States; (2) the UK policy of encouraging the use of independent providers for routine operations in the UK health care system; and (3) the use of private providers for public schools in Philadelphia. According to Barber (2007, p. 22), evidence on the quality of impact of the â€Å"quasi-market† approach is mixed but â€Å"success seems to depend on the precise design of the program†. In third approach, â€Å"devolution and transparency,† government devolves â€Å"responsibility to the frontline units delivering the service and then use transparency† or making public the results in a way that allows comparison s to drive performance higher (Barber 2007, p. 22). On the other hand, Briggs and Fisher (2006, p. 30) advanced that the three paradigms of public sector management are the traditional public administration approach, the new public management paradigm, and the public value management. In the traditional public management approach, public managers are assumed to have the task of ensuring that rules and appropriate procedures are followed and that the public sector has the monopoly of the service ethos