The governance of multi-sector public service delivery networks.

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The use of market-inspired instruments for steering public service delivery has become ubiquitous across developed economies and yet the experience with contracting for complex services suggests that we are still in the steep portion of the learning curve on how to do this well. Under such approaches there are pervasive risks of wholesale market failure (as seen in the case of Carillion) as well as market malfunctioning, experienced in the repeatedly poor performance of more complex, cross-cutting public service delivery. The primary government response to this outsourcing dilemma acknowledges that large amounts of tax-payers' money will continue to be channelled through private sector and voluntary sector providers and offers recommendations for tightening up market stewardship and contract terms. This return - to what has elsewhere been described as a "byzantine tower of rules and regulations" (Brown et al., 2018, p. 740) - fails to connect with the latest empirical contracting practice from the private sector (as illustrated through emergent 'formal relational contracting' practice) or from smaller local experiments with networked governance arrangements (for example, City Region-level coordination via integration boards with prime 'outcome' contracts (Whitworth & Carter, 2018) and local authorities' use of social impact bonds). This Fellowship seeks to deploy a novel selection of research methods to identify and inform alternative governance and contracting practices that may be deployed to more effectively and efficiently coordinate service provision. The proposed project aims to investigate alternative commissioning approaches available when there is an ambition to foster collaboration and collective accountability across an interwoven network of provider organisations. The animating research question asks: How can government better steward complex networks of service provision to more holistically and better support citizens with complex lives and who currently interact with a range of public service actors? Crucially, the way the quasi-market and contracts are structured will have important implications for attuning the attentiveness of service providers to the priorities of either the state, service users, or providers themselves. This in turn is expected to have important implications for the quantity, cost, quality, distribution and cohesiveness of services and consequently on the lived experience and 'outcomes' of citizens engaged in social programmes. This ambitious, discipline-spanning Fellowship proposal seeks to entwine theoretical developments at the interface of public administration, applied economics and social policy, with empirical work facilitated through collaboration with two British central Government departments. Partnership with the Department for Work and Pensions and the Government Inclusive Economy Unit within the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport will elevate research impact and substantively enhance our understanding of the key mechanisms for successful public service contracting and stewardship. The planned Fellowship brings the opportunity to extend the applicant's already vibrant publication record and emergent scholarly leadership. The host institution - the Blavatnik School of Government at the University of Oxford - offers strong and substantive endorsement of the Fellowship. Here Dr Carter and her current team at the Government Outcomes Lab are expected to be vital to the School's future hub of expertise in public service excellence. Crucially, the UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship brings the opportunity for Dr Carter to carve time to further develop an independent academic identity. The duration and explicit emphasis on the development of leadership potential make this Fellowship the ideal scheme for Dr Carter to bolster the intellectual underpinning of this emergent field at the intersection of social policy and public management.