The New Public Service Ethos

Abstract

There has been a great deal of research into the effects which the political, organisational and cultural changes already noted have had on the practices and structures of the public sector. Arguing predominantly from an anti-Thatcherite and broadly pro-public service perspective, much of the research has argued, amongst other things, that the introduction of private sector motivations and practices has weakened the core ethos of public service within the public sector. In addition there is, and has been for some years, a general unease in what (for want of anything more precise) might be called ‘the public mind’ about the conduct of public life in the UK. This sense of moral malaise is real and reflects a change in public perception which is the consequence of some of the unanticipated (at least by the ordinary citizen) outcomes of the important, and broadly publicly supported (if only in retrospect!) ‘Thatcherite’ reforms of the 1980’s.