Co-creation: A New Pathway for Solving Dysfunctionalities in Governance Systems?

• Author: Tina Øllgaard Bentzen
• Date: 01 July 2022
• DOI: 10.1177/00953997211055100
• Published date: 01 July 2022
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/00953997211055100

Administration & Society

2022, Vol. 54(6) 1148 –1177

© The Author(s) 2021

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DOI: 10.1177/00953997211055100

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Article

Co-creation: A New

Pathway for Solving

Dysfunctionalities in

Governance Systems?

Tina Øllgaard Bentzen1

Abstract

Although governance systems play a crucial role in securing an accountable

public sector, they can grow overly resource demanding, cause problematic

distortion of welfare tasks and crowd out motivation among employees.

This study contributes to existing literature by conceptualizing co-creation

as a pathway for solving dysfunctionalities in governance systems and

explores the prospects of such an approach. Based on a case study of the

development of a municipal supervision system, the study outlines the

characteristics of co-creating governance systems. The results points to co-

creation as a promising, although resource demanding, pathway for finding

robust solutions to dysfunctionalities in governance systems.

Keywords

cocreation, outcomes of cocreation, supervision, governance systems

Introduction

Governance systems play a significant role in coordinating, managing, and

controlling public welfare tasks and therefor in many ways constitute the

backbone of an accountable public sector (du Gay, 2000; Schnedler &

1Roskilde Universitet, Sjælland, Denmark

Corresponding Author:

Tina Øllgaard Bentzen, Roskilde Universitet, Roskilde School of Governance, Universitetsvej

1, Roskilde, Sjælland 4000, Denmark.

Email: tinaob@ruc.dk

1055100AAS0010.1177/00953997211055100Administration & SocietyBentzen

research-article2021

Bentzen 1149

Vadovic, 2011). While governance systems are used as a broader term in

descriptions of institutions and their design (Duit & Galaz, 2008; Teisman

et al., 2009), this study revolves around governance systems in a more nar-

row form: governance systems are defined as tools within public adminis-

tration used to align employee capabilities, resources, activities, or

performance with organizational goals, through the regulation of autonomy,

counting, that is, systems for resource management, documentation, perfor-

mance monitoring, and supervision (Edelenbos & Eshuis, 2012; Sitkin

et al., 2010; Verhoest et al., 2004).

While productive and well-functioning governance systems play a crucial

role in securing fundamental values like transparency, accountability, and

equality, dysfunctions of such governance systems are also commonplace in

public administration (Bozeman & Feeney, 2015; de Jongh, 2016; Hood &

Dixon, 2015). Well-known dysfunctions include tendencies for governance

systems to mushroom into resource-demanding, overly bureaucratic systems,

as well as problematic side effects like tunnel vision, parking, and creaming

(de Bruijn, 2002; Lipsky, 2010; Merton, 1940). Not only, are such dysfunc-

tions feared for hampering efficiency and eroding quality in welfare tasks,

but are also known for crowding out motivation among public employees.

Co-creation is increasingly explored as a strategy for solving wicked

problems, characterized by high complexity, fragmentation, and a plurality

of actors with different interests at stake (Rittel & Webber, 1973; van

Bueren et al., 2003; Weber & Khademian, 2008). Originally developed in

the private sector, the key question in co-creation was how to engage cus-

tomers in private service markets in the creation of the service they are

purchasing (Vargo & Lusch, 2004). Co-creation has later been adopted into

the public sector as an approach to develop service solutions and policies

with citizens and users (Brandsen et al., 2018; Nabatchi, 2012; Torfing,

Sørensen, & Bentzen, 2019). However, the prospect of using co-creation to

develop solutions to problems related to governance systems in the public

sector has received scare attention in the literature (Farshchian &

Thomassen, 2019; Simonofski et al., 2019). The ambition of this study is to

contribute to fill this research gap by developing a framework for studying

the prospects of using co-creation as a strategy for finding solutions to dys-

functional governance system in the public sector. Hence, the research

question guiding this study is: How can co-creation be operationalized to

address problems of dysfunctional governance systems within the public

sector and what are the outcomes of such an approach?

First, drawing on the co-creation literature (Brandsen et al., 2018; Torfing

et al., 2019a; Voorberg et al., 2015), a theoretical framework is developed

which frames dysfunctionalities of governance systems as complex, “wicked