Book review: The Ombudsman Enterprise and Administrative Justice
| Date | 01 March 2012 |
| Published date | 01 March 2012 |
| DOI | 10.1177/096466391102100101 |
| Author | Chris Gill |
| Subject Matter | Book reviews |
Book reviews
TREVOR BUCK, RICHARD KIRKHAM AND BRIAN THOMPSON,
The Ombudsman Enterprise and Administrative Justice. Farnham: Ashgate Publishing, 2011, 294 pp.,
ISBN 9780754675563, £70 (hbk)
The Ombudsman Enterprise and Administrative Justice is a valuable contribution to the
literature on ombudsmen and administrative justice. While using examples from around
the world, it focuses on public sector ombudsmen in the United Kingdom and their
developing role within the administrative justice system and the constitution. The book
provides an extensive review of the literature in these areas and, using a range of pub-
lished sources, a detailed analysis of ombudsmen operations and the governance land-
scape in which they operate. The book is also supported by interview data with the
global ombudsmen community collected as part an Economic and Social Research
Council funded project (Thompson et al., 2008).
By discussing the institution of the ombudsman in a broader systemic context, the
book’s approach represents a welcome departure from previous literature which has
tended to discuss elements of the administrative justice system in isolation. The approach
also breaks the mould of much ombudsmen literature by focusing on generic operational
themes and the techniques ombudsmen use to fulfil their roles, rather than detailed
descriptions of their jurisdictions and powers. In terms of the administrative justice lit-
erature, the book is unusual in mainstreaming ombudsmen and discussing administrative
justice from what has traditionally been a marginalised perspective. It also provides a
sound overview of administrative justice theory and builds on existing models by devel-
oping a useful overarching typology.
The book advances a number of interesting arguments, with three areas standing out.
These relate to: the place of ombudsmen within the constitution; the importance of
accountability and governance contexts; and the increasing importance to the mission
of ombudsmen of generating administrative improvement. These key arguments are
sketched out below, before describing the structure of the book and providing an over-
view of the matters covered in each part.
The book’s constitutional argument is that ombudsmen (along with other accountabil-
ity institutions) represent an extension to the traditional conception of the constitution
and the tripartite separation of powers between the executive, Parliament and the judi-
ciary (p.24). The authors argue that the increasing use of accountability institutions rep-
resents an important constitutional development. In terms of ombudsmen, the authors
Social & Legal Studies
21(1) 135–152
ªThe Author(s) 2012
Reprints and permission:
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DOI: 10.1177/0964663911432728
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