Neoliberalism and New Public Management: decision-making and accountability in a public–private partnership

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate public disclosures and accountability for government decision-making in the case of a major prison project delivered through a Public–Private Partnership (PPP) in the State of Victoria (Australia).Design/methodology/approachThe study explores a unique case to provide insights into public disclosures for PPPs in a jurisdiction that is a recognised leader in PPP policy and practice. The analysis is theoretically framed by an understanding of neoliberalism and New Public Management, and draws on data from case-specific reporting, media reporting and public policy, to examine interconnections between accounting, public discourse and accountability.FindingsThe analysis shows how publicly available information relating to key government decisions routinely lacked supporting evidence or explanation, even though areas of subjectivity were recognised in public policy. Accounting was deployed numerically and discursively to present potentially contestable decisions as being based on common-sense “facts”. The implied “truth” status of government reporting is problematised by media disclosure of key issues absent from government disclosures.Social implicationsUnder neoliberalism, accountingisation can help depoliticise the public sphere and limit discourse by constructing ostensible “facts” in an inherently contestable arena. By contrast, democratic accountability requires public disclosures that infuse a critical dialogical public sphere.Originality/valueThe paper shows how neoliberalism can be embedded in public policies and institutional practices, and buttressed by the use of accounting. The analysis illuminates the persistence and “failing forward” character of neoliberalism, whereby crises are addressed through further neoliberalisation.

[1]  Pamela Stapleton,et al.  The impact of hybridity on PPP governance and related accountability mechanisms: the case of UK education PPPs , 2021, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal.

[2]  G. Boyce,et al.  PPPs and non-financial value: a critical analysis of public policy and implications for social, environmental and indigenous cultural values , 2020 .

[3]  Heather Whiteside.  Public-private partnerships: market development through management reform , 2020, Review of International Political Economy.

[4]  G. Hodge,et al.  P3s and Social Infrastructure: Three Decades of Prison Reform in Victoria, Australia , 2020 .

[5]  M. Mårtensson,et al.  When Calculative Practices are No More: On the De‐Accountingization of the Operational Level of a Public Sector Agency , 2019, Financial Accountability & Management.

[6]  I. Lapsley,et al.  Transforming the public sector: 1998–2018 , 2019, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal.

[7]  G. Hodge,et al.  Cheaper, better, and more accountable? Twenty‐five years of prisons privatisation in Victoria , 2019, Australian Journal of Public Administration.

[8]  N. Theodore,et al.  Still Neoliberalism? , 2019, South Atlantic Quarterly.

[9]  Richard Lane,et al.  The Managerial Lineages of Neoliberalism , 2019 .

[10]  M. Pusey.  Economic rationalism in Canberra 25 years on? , 2018 .

[11]  P. O’Keeffe.  Who wouldn’t want more efficiency? Analysing the construction of efficiency as a ‘truth’ within policy discourses , 2018 .

[12]  G. Hodge,et al.  Choose Your Own Adventure: Finding a Suitable Discount Rate for Evaluating Value for Money in Public–Private Partnership Proposals* , 2017 .

[13]  Pamela Stapleton,et al.  Examining the use of corporate governance mechanisms in operational Public-Private Partnerships: Why do they not deliver public accountability? , 2017 .

[14]  M. Hurk,et al.  Ppp policy, depoliticisation, and anti-politics , 2017 .

[15]  Helen Tregidga.  “Speaking truth to power”: analysing shadow reporting as a form of shadow accounting , 2017 .

[16]  I. Demirag,et al.  Public sector reforms and public private partnerships: Overview and research agenda , 2017 .

[17]  Lachlan McDonald-Kerr.  Water, water, everywhere: Using silent accounting to examine accountability for a desalination project , 2017 .

[18]  I. Thomson,et al.  Activism, Arenas and Accounts in Conflicts over Tobacco Control , 2015 .

[19]  G. Hodge,et al.  The Victorian Government's prison privatisation project (1992-2010): The pathway to efficiency? A longitudinal analysis , 2014 .

[20]  R. Gray,et al.  New accounts: Towards a reframing of social accounting , 2014 .

[21]  Iqbal Khadaroo.  The valuation of risk transfer in UK school public private partnership contracts , 2014 .

[22]  David R. Upton,et al.  Three '-isations': thinking with but beyond the sociological in comprehending accounting in a global context , 2013 .

[23]  M. Aalbers,et al.  Neoliberalism is Dead … Long Live Neoliberalism! , 2013 .

[24]  I. Demirag,et al.  The Diffusion of Risks in Public Private Partnership Contracts , 2012 .

[25]  P. Andon.  Accounting‐related research in PPPs/PFIs: present contributions and future opportunities , 2012 .

[26]  N. Brenner,et al.  Neoliberalism Resurgent? Market Rule after the Great Recession , 2012 .

[27]  J. Shaoul,et al.  Accountability and corporate governance of public private partnerships , 2012 .

[28]  D. Cahill,et al.  Value for money? Neoliberalism and New South Wales prisons , 2009 .

[29]  Iqbal Khadaroo,et al.  The actual evaluation of school PFI bids for value for money in the UK Public Sector , 2008 .

[30]  Pamela Baxter,et al.  Qualitative Case Study Methodology: Study Design and Implementation for Novice Researchers , 2008 .

[31]  David J. Cooper,et al.  Case Study Research in Accounting , 2008 .

[32]  J. Andrew.  Prisons, the profit motive and other challenges to accountability , 2007 .

[33]  D. Harvey.  Neoliberalism as Creative Destruction , 2007 .

[34]  M. Flinders,et al.  Depoliticisation: Principles, Tactics and Tools , 2006 .

[35]  A. Barton.  Professional Accounting Standards and the Public Sector - A Mismatch , 2005 .

[36]  Jean Shaoul,et al.  A critical financial analysis of the Private Finance Initiative: Selecting a financing method or allocating economic wealth? , 2005 .

[37]  Christine Cooper,et al.  Independently verified reductionism: Prison privatization in Scotland , 2005 .

[38]  Wayne Cameron,et al.  Public accountability: Effectiveness, equity, ethics , 2004 .

[39]  J. Broadbent,et al.  PPPs: Nature, Development And Unanswered Questions , 2004 .

[40]  R. Walker,et al.  Risk Weighting and Accounting Choices in Public‐Private Partnerships: Case Study of a Failed Prison Contract , 2004 .

[41]  C. Dey,et al.  Corporate ‘silent’ and ‘shadow’ social accounting , 2003 .

[42]  J. Shaoul.  New Developments: A Financial Appraisal of the London Underground Public-Private Partnership , 2002 .

[43]  G. Boyce.  Public discourse and decision making: Exploring possibilities for financial, social and environmental accounting , 2000 .

[44]  C. Hood.  The “new public management” in the 1980s: Variations on a theme , 1995 .

[45]  P. Rouse,et al.  The perceived efficacy of public-private partnerships: A study from Canada , 2019, Critical Perspectives on Accounting.

[46]  J. Dillard,et al.  TITLE : Accounting , accountants and accountability regimes in pluralistic societies , 2015 .

[47]  J. Gill,et al.  Identifying and controlling risk: The problem of uncertainty in the private finance initiative in the UK's National Health Service , 2008 .