Contract Culture and Target Fetishism
- 1 February 1997
- journal article
- Published by SAGE Publications in Local Economy: The Journal of the Local Economy Policy Unit
- Vol. 11 (4), 343-357
- https://doi.org/10.1080/02690949708726350
Abstract
Performance management in TECs1 and urban initiatives has developed in the 1990s into a “contract culture” characterised by heavy reliance on quantitative indicators as the basis for funding arrangements. These indicators may have perverse effects. Firstly, they may distort the design of local policy at the level of strategic planning and SRB (Single Regeneration Budget) bid-writing. Secondly, their use in contracts between TECs, City Challenge companies, SRB partnerships and their delivery agencies may distort policy implementation. An instructive parallel may be drawn between this “indicator distortion” and the distortions induced by planning targets in the former Soviet Union.Keywords
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