Comparing transnational organizational innovation in state administration and local government

The article explore three issues: 1) How widespread and important are various forms of transnational organizational innovation in the Danish public sector? 2) How are these organizational innovations related to each other? 3) What are the differences and similarities in transnational organizational innovation between state administration and local government and how can they be explained? By transnational organizational innovations are understood innovative forms of organization that can be found in the public sector of many countries. The focus of the analysis is in part, on differences and similarities between different forms of organizational innovation and in part, on differences and similarities between state and municipal organizations. Eleven forms of organizational innovation often related to New Public Management (NPM), are included in the empirical analyses: Privatization/Outsourcing, Purchaser-Provider models, Management by Contract, Management by Objectives, Benchmarking, Balanced scorecard, Pay-for-performance, Lean and value-based management. The empirical basis of the article is surveys conducted in the Danish municipalities in the autumn of 2008 and in the state in the spring of 2009. We find that NPM tools have had a much stronger impact in local government than in state administration. The
reasons for and the implications of this finding are discussed.