FROM PRIVATE CHOICE TO PUBLIC VALUE

Greater choice in public services has been one of the recent mantras for both the Labour and Conservative parties. This has provoked a flurry of debate in both academic and policy circles. There has therefore been a growing critique of choice as an adequate concept to motivate and mobilize a further wave of public service reform. This lecture will discuss the proposition that a more potent concept to provide a rationale for public service reform and improvement and innovation is ‘public value’.