Public sector reform and the public interest in Australia

Contemporary public sector reforms in Australia have been dominated by efficiency, productivity and contestability considerations captured in the National Competition Policy (NCP). Both in the reform process in general and in the NCP processes in particular, the lack of priority attributed to non-economic concerns such as co-ordination, equity, representation, political accountability, consultation and distributive outcomes has been a serious omission. The idea of public interest, once central to democratic public administration, has re-emerged to challenge the perceived excesses of economic rationalism as the unifying idea of reform. In this article it is argued that substantive situational manifestations of public interest can be used to complement rather than undermine the efficiency, productivity and contestability objectives of public sector reform.