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This article explores the concept of the commodification of the public good and its impacts. It discusses how public services, such as healthcare, have shifted from being centrally-funded and managed to being commissioned and traded. The article examines the philosophical, economic, social, and political drivers of commodification and its empirical manifestations. It also highlights the impacts of commodification on service content, outcomes, and the relationships between commissioners, providers, and users of services. The article concludes that while commodification may enhance awareness of what is being bought, it can also disadvantage those who cannot exploit its mechanisms. [Extracted from the article]

An analysis of policy and practice documents on information-sharing in the transition of military personnel into civilian life finds (1) a complex transition pathway along which the responsibility for co-ordination of transition shifts from service providers to those in transition; (2) a lack of attention to operationalizing information-sharing for different service circumstances; (3) the potential for developing a framework for managing information-sharing; and (4) a need for further research to draw on the evidence of transitions and information-sharing in other policy sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

While financial management in the Civil Service has improved in the past few years, the management of human resources has lagged behind The National Audit Office intends to develop human resources management audit in order to give a boost to this activity, but what are the issues to be covered? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the importance of political factors in the management of organizations, particularly in the public sector in Great Britain. One of the differences between management in the private and the public sectors is the overt and direct political character of the latter. Management in British central government has traditionally been driven primarily by the need to meet political demands, specially those of a department minister. Account has to be taken, therefore, of the influence of political and constitutional imperatives on the development of performance indicators within departments. This can be expressed in a number of ways including the degree to which the demands of the political process impinge upon a department's operations. Here, the higher the political status of a department the greater will be the attention a minister devotes to political issues and the less to those concerned with management. This will be reflected in ambiguous departmental uses of accountable management. On the other hand, the way some issues are now debated in managerialist terms produces a multiplier effect in which political demands reinforce the drive for managerial reform. As a result, greater attention is paid to the development of accountable management.

The article discusses various reports published within the issue; including the perceptions of implementing new developments in policy and practice, the comparative analysis on the methods used by various organizations and jurisdictions in Great Britain and the assessment of policies.

The author considers the relationship between Great Britain's academia and public service organizations, referencing an article written by Christopher Pollitt on the subject from a 2006 issue of "Public Money & Management." He personifies practice and academia to display their interaction, saying that the practice of public service does not want to listen to academia, leading academia to react by becoming critical to practice and adopting an air of superiority. The involvement of the New Labour party in the evaluation of industry is mentioned. The author feels that mutual recognition between academia and practice is necessary to foster an effective relationship that will aid both government administration and researchers.

Introduces articles on public management.

Introduces a series of articles on public management.

Comments on the call for proactive and sustained policy of the local government in Great Britain. Factors raising the political visibility of the sector; Absence of indicators linking spending to service outcomes; Failure of the investment of governmental infrastructure of the political system.

The Public Management and Policy Association (PMPA) has published Modernizing the Policy Process by Michael Bichard, Chair of the PMPA and Permanent Secretary of the Department for Education and Employment. In a genuinely far-sighted exploration, that the changes under way will require an approach to organizational learning that moves away from an emphasis on the individual performance or skill of the public manager to a focus on the organizational process through which reflection, exploration and inquiry are promoted.

1997 was a year of concern not only for local government; the payment for questions saga continued to excite British Parliament, helped greatly by the valiant efforts of Neil Hamilton to keep his case in the public eye following electoral defeat by the man-in-the-white-suit, Martin Bell. And, not to be left out, events in the National Health Service, notably the fall-out from questionable payments to employees in the old Yorkshire Region, suggested that lessons had not been fully learnt from the earlier experiences of Wessex and West Midlands Regional Health Authorities. The articles on public service ethics brought together in the January-March 1998 issue of the journal "Public Money & Management" are drawn from a symposium held at the University of Durham in September 1997. The aim of this symposium was to begin a systematic reflection on issues raised by these and related events. Thus the nature of ethics was discussed, the classes of unethical behaviour, current sources of pressure on ethical conduct and ways of managing their effects.

The article describes the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) announced by the Conservative government in 1992 in Great Britain. At its simplest, the PFI allows public authorities to contract with private sector entities for the provision of capital finance and an acceptance of some of the venture's risks in return for an operator's licence to provide specified services. Although originally conceived as a means of attracting private investment into capital intensive policy sectors with traditions of public-private partnerships, the scope of the PFI has been gradually extended into services such as health, prisons, housing, museums, defense and even education. The PFI may be questionable as a mechanism of public policy and certainly imposes considerable technical, organizational and political demands on participants. But there may yet be real benefits from judicious use of the opportunities offered. If the PFI is to be a major contributor to the restoration of public infrastructure, the government will need to pay less attention than its predecessor to securing big hits and concentrate instead on developing and testing a viable long term regime in which projects can be contracted and managed.

The author reflects on the consumerism in public services. He assesses that it is a topical issue, thus, the journal hope to focus on it in a themed edition planned for early 2009. He implies that he has been concerned that the attempt to pay more attention to the needs of service users may be undermined by the indiscriminate variety of users. Hence, he encourages contributions to the journal's themed edition because it aims to inform the appropriate developments of service relationships.

The author of the article notifies readers of the journal "Public Money & Management" that the journal will be published bi-monthly in 2008 in response to reader demand. There has been increased demand for the journal's themed issues and later editions this year will offer articles by guest editor Joop Koppenjan addressing the safeguarding of public values, and articles about sustainable development by guest editors Jan Bebbington and Amanda Ball. The current issue considers Lean thinking, and how it applies to Great Britain's service economy. It considers the subject of service design and how it can benefit the public.

The author reflects on how the publishers of "Public Money & Management" have announced an increase in the number of issues to be published annually as well as an increase in the number of pages per issue. The author touts the reader reception of themed editions that have offered advice to practitioners and academics.

The authors observe that quantitative performance reviews have become a dominant feature of British public services management. Meanwhile, lots of questions arise about the validity of specific measurements as representative of overall performance. Scrutiny is also warranted for attempts to game the system and for distortion of an entire effort to meet performance metrics. Explanations are due for the reasons for varying interpretations of the approach, with come agencies building entire processes around the measures and other agencies downplaying them.

This article presents explanations from the editors of the periodical Public Money & Management on their 2005 editions which constitute the 25th volume. We have been marking the occasion with special editions that include analyses of current issues with historical reflections on the past quarter century. In the January edition we considered performance and innovation. In future editions we shall focus on three particularly significant policy areas -- transport (June), health (August), and criminal justice (October) -- and in January 2006 we shall take stock of public service ethics in standards. For a number of years readers have expressed their interest in the various viewpoints that have usually begun each edition. These have been short, argumentative pieces about particular policy, management and evidential issues. Increasingly we have been encouraged to publish longer, more considered and evidentially-based arguments, as well as the traditional short viewpoint. The additional space that have come with our increase from four to five editions per volume has allowed us to respond positively to this suggestion. Thus, beginning with this edition, we are enhancing our viewpoints into a "Debate" section and we invite contributions to it.

This section offers updates on the periodical "Public Money & Management," including the increase in the frequency and size of the periodical by January 2004.

The article presents information on the Public Money & Management journal. The editors and Blackwell Publishing are increasing the frequency of release of the magazine from quarterly to five issues per year starting January 2004, in response to an enhanced readership, valued position and a steady rise in submitted articles. At least initially, the three of the five issues will comprise miscellanies. All other features of the journal and its articles will remain unchanged. The journal has been increasing its reputation among a multidisciplinary and international community eager to enhance knowledge and understanding of the challenge of managing public services. Blackwell Publishing's survey of readers also strongly endorsed Public Money & Management's position as a bridge of academic and practitioner interests. The journal's readers include a wide variety of public service officials, academics, students, journalists, politicians and consultants and advisers working with the public services.