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Citizens’ contracts as a tricky steering medium

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The Illusion of Management Control

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Abstract

In this chapter I seek to analyse how the form of contract is reshaped to work as a public steering medium in relation to citizens. In private law a contract is defined as a voluntary agreement binding on individual freedom. Freedom and personal responsibility are presumed in private contracting. However, today’s public sector is making a misreading of private contracting in the logic of public steering, turning the causality upside down. Public contracting with individual citizens is seen as a technology for the making of individual freedom and responsibility, turning the single individual citizen into a partner of the state.

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Authors
  1. Niels Åkerstrøm Andersen
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Niels Thygesen

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© 2012 Niels Åkerstrøm Andersen

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Andersen, N.Å. (2012). Citizens’ contracts as a tricky steering medium. In: Thygesen, N. (eds) The Illusion of Management Control. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230365391_5

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