Book Reviews: The Citizen's Charter
| Author | Clive Gray |
| Published date | 01 March 1997 |
| Date | 01 March 1997 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/014473949701700109 |
| Published By | Sage Publications, Inc. |
| Subject Matter | Book Review |
Book Reviews
judgement. To take one example, the extract from Barbara Castle's (1973)
article in the Sunday Times on mandarin power and the need for ministers to
have political support (by far the oldest extract in the book) is both delightful
and salutary; the latter because
of
its reminder that, whilst there has been
substantial change in the public service, many fundamental problems remain
substantially unresolved.
This is a very good book. The author is to be congratulated on his achievement,
as indeed are the Open University Press for producing a paperback version
of
the book at an affordable price.
MICHAEL
BUNT
Sheffield Hallam University
THE
CITIZEN'S
CHARTER
J.
A.
Chandler
(Ed)
(Dartmouth, Aldershot, 1996, pp vii + 165, £39.50hbk)
The result
of
the 1997 election has inevitably meant that British public
administration and management have entered a period
of
change. It is helpful,
therefore, to have some sort
of
base-line statement
of
the current standing
of
particular issues against which to assess future changes. This book provides
such a statement on the Citizen's Charter.
After a number
of
critical chapters on the idea
of
the Charter itself, in terms
of
customers, accountability and quality management, further chapters consider
the operation
of
the Charter in the areas
of
the NHS, education, housing, British
Rail and Local Government.
Not surprisingly, perhaps, many
of
the criticisms relate to the way in which the
Charter has been put into practice in these areas, emphasising in particular the
transformation
of
the 'citizen' (with democratic rights and responsibilities) into
the 'consumer' (with rights attached to an economic conception
of
the
individual). Such a change is
of
key importance for understanding the extent to
which the ideologies
of
the Conservative Party have transformed the British
public sector, and it is regrettable that only one Chapter in this collection (by
Morris and Haigh) places the Charter in any sort
of
historical perspective.
83
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