Beyond Engagement and Participation: User and Community Coproduction of Public Services
2007/09/01 by Tony Bovaird · 1,946 citations
Health Professions · Social Sciences · #Business #Context (archaeology) #Coproduction #Corporate governance #Economics #Finance #Healthcare innovation and challenges #Incentive #Marketing #Mental Health and Patient Involvement #Negotiation #Political science #Public Policy and Administration Research #Public administration #Public relations #Reinterpretation #Service (business) #Service delivery framework
paper · doi:10.1111/j.1540-6210.2007.00773.x
published in Public Administration Review 67(5), 846-860 (Wiley)
openalex publication_date 2007/09/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/04
Abstract
In recent years, there has been a radical reinterpretation of the role of policy making and service delivery in the public domain. Policy making is no longer seen as a purely top‐down process but rather as a negotiation among many interacting policy systems. Similarly, services are no longer simply delivered by professional and managerial staff in public agencies but are coproduced by users and their communities. This article presents a conceptual framework for understanding the emerging role of user and community coproduction and presents several case studies that illustrate how different forms of coproduction have played out in practice. Traditional conceptions of service planning and management are now outdated and need to be revised to account for coproduction as an integrating mechanism and an incentive for resource mobilization—a potential that is still greatly underestimated. However, coproduction in the context of multipurpose, multistakeholder networks raises important public governance issues that have implications for public services reform.
Citations
Cited by
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