Strategic Management in Public Organizations: Profiling the Public Entrepreneur as Strategist

• Author: Ewan Ferlie,Edoardo Ongaro
• Date: 01 May 2020
• Published date: 01 May 2020
• DOI: 10.1177/0275074020909514
• Subject Matter: Articles

909514ARPXXX10.1177/0275074020909514The American Review of Public AdministrationOngaro and Ferlie
research-article2020
Article
American Review of Public Administration
2020, Vol. 50(4-5) 360 –374
Strategic Management in Public
© The Author(s) 2020
Organizations: Profiling the Public
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Entrepreneur as Strategist
https://doi.org/10.1177/0275074020909514
DOI: 10.1177/0275074020909514
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Edoardo Ongaro1 and Ewan Ferlie2
Abstract
Our core argument is that the entrepreneurial school of thought in strategic management as conceptualized by Mintzberg and
colleagues holds explanatory value for advancing knowledge about the behavior of public sector organizations, as it does for
private firms, albeit with important qualifications when applied to public services: chiefly, the temporal limitation in post for
the office-holder of a public organization. After describing our methods, we present qualitative data from a longitudinal case
study of strategy making in an European Union (EU) agency, the European Aviation Safety Agency, which has become a key
actor globally in civil aviation. Our interpretation of the case suggests the additional usefulness of the entrepreneurial school
of strategy, suitably adapted for public agency settings, as an explanatory prism to enlarge the repertoire of conceptual tools
for the study of public agencies. Our broader argument is that the field of strategic management may provide theoretical
resources for the study of public agencies, provided its theoretical lenses are properly selected and adapted.
Keywords
strategic management, public entrepreneur, public agency, civil aviation, European Union
Introduction
(EASA) led this public organization (an agency of the
European Union (EU)) to become the second most important
Our core argument is that the “entrepreneurial school of
player on the world stage in civil aviation, after the U.S.
thought in strategic management” as conceptualized by
Federal Aviation Authority, over the relatively short time
Mintzberg and colleagues (1998, 2009, chapter 5) holds
period 2003–2012. The case shows how the entrepreneurial
explanatory value for advancing knowledge about the behav-
school of strategic management helps explain the behavior
ior of public services organizations, alongside its widely rec-
of “core” public bureaucracies, provided the qualifying
ognized explanatory power for commercial organizations in
traits of the public entrepreneur are appropriately profiled.
competitive markets. A proper understanding of the role of the
We thus outline some qualifying traits of public entrepre-
entrepreneur as strategist within public organizations requires
neurship, meaning the entrepreneur active in public services
some specific qualifications, though, which this article aims to
organizations, and notably in organizations established by
unveil. Specifically, we elaborate on how statutory limit to the
and operating under the regulation of public and administra-
term of office in the public sector (a feature of most public
tive law. The findings of this case study help derive the pro-
posts, at least in liberal-democratic regimes) qualifies the ways
file of the “public entrepreneur,” thus expanding in a novel
in which the entrepreneurial school of thought in strategic
direction the limited literature on strategic management
management can be applied to public organizations. This way,
for public organizations (e.g., Berry, 1994; Bryson, 2018;
a theoretical prism from the disciplinary field of strategic man-
Bryson et al., 2010; Ferlie & Ongaro, 2015: an early theori-
agement can be brought into the field of public management
zation of strategic management for public organizations is
and added to the repertoire of conceptual tools utilized in pub-
developed by Ring & Perry, 1985). Strategic management is
lic administration and management to study public agencies,
in our view an underutilized theoretical source within public
like those drawn from political science (e.g., Carpenter’s study
of the forging of agency autonomy, Carpenter, 2001; Downs’
1Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
inside bureaucracy, Downs, 1967; Peters’ politics of bureau-
2King’s College London, UK
cracy, Peters, 2018) or public choice (e.g., Dunleavy’s bureau-
shaping model, Dunleavy, 1991).
Corresponding Author:
Edoardo Ongaro, Open University, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes MK7
We develop our argument through the case study of how
6AA, UK.
the director general of the European Aviation Safety Agency
Email: edoardo.ongaro@open.ac.uk

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Ongaro and Ferlie
361
management, which may contribute to better the understand-
more collective in thrust. It is important to note that this, nec-
ing of how public officials lead public organizations, thus
essarily brief, review of the literature points mostly to the con-
contributing to the burgeoning literature on public leadership
temporary treatments of the notion of public entrepreneur—but
by furnishing a distinctive angle from which to add to it.
the idea has olden roots in a number of works: Meltsner’s
(1976, 1990) qualification of the policy analysist as a “politi-
Literature Review: Profiling the Public
cal actor” and his characterization of how such figure may per-
Entrepreneur
form a key role in effecting change goes a long way in
identifying a figure in many respects akin to the public entre-
The Notion of Public Entrepreneurship in the
preneur delineated in this article: Indeed, we argue a distinc-
Literature
tive contribution of this article lies in revisiting the analytics
of both how the public entrepreneur may (re)shape the public
A first and major distinction is between entrepreneurship
sector (how this form of exercising individual agency can be
exercised within the core public sector, the entrepreneurial
productive of social effects) and how contextual influences—
behavior brought about in the pursuit of distinctively public
notably the different traditions of governance detectable
functions, and the notion of public entrepreneurship to denote
across countries and jurisdictions in the world (Bevir, 2009;
the running of state-owned enterprises. The former is the
Pierre & Peters, 2000; Pollitt & Bouckaert, 2017)—may
focus of this work: understanding how entrepreneurial behav-
shape the form of this social action; in other words, there is
ior may bear significance also within the core bureaucracy, a
not one type of public entrepreneur, but to some extent public
place not expected to be awash with the entrepreneurial spirit.
entrepreneurship is contextually embedded. Finally, and from
The latter concerns the running of enterprises which are pub-
a more normative standpoint, it has also been questioned in
lic in the sense of being owned or controlled by the govern-
the literature whether public entrepreneurship is compatible,
ment; such state-owned enterprises may pursue different
or at least reconcilable, with democracy (Bellone & Goerl,
goals, and there may a plurality of motives whereby they are
1992) or even a danger for it (Terry, 1993).
in public hand (Bernier, 2014, provides an account of public
To our knowledge, however, there is in the literature no
enterprises seen as instruments of public policy; it is in this
discussion of public entrepreneurship conducted in the per-
sense that, interestingly, the term gets mentioned one of the
spective of the entrepreneurial school of thought as developed
first times in Elinor Ostrom’s 1965 dissertation at Indiana
in the field of strategic management, notably by Mintzberg
University (Ostrom, 1965)—to then get to be used with a
and colleagues: that is, it is absent a discussion of the public
meaning more closely associated with the entrepreneurial
entrepreneur as strategist, as the key actor in the forming of
spirit brought into the role of the public administrator in later
the organizational strategy, and hence on how her or his
works of the same author (e.g., Ostrom, 2005).
behavior may shape the way in which strategy forms in the
Llewellyn and coauthors have contributed to specifying
public organization. It is to the application of this school of
the domain of application of the entrepreneurial behavior
thought that we now turn, to qualify the public entrepreneur
brought about in the pursuit of distinctively public functions:
as the strategist of the public organization, and the entrepre-
the public administrator deploying the entrepreneurial spirit
neurial school of thought in strategic management as one
in the way in which she or he conceives of her or his job.
framework to explain how strategy may form in public orga-
Llewellyn and Jones aptly distinguish two types of entrepre-
nizations, under certain conditions and qualifications. We do
neurial action. The first type is conducted away from the core
so by resorting to the highly influential approach wrought
service and is governed by commercial considerations: It is
out by Henry Mintzberg and colleagues (1998, 2009).
about bringing out of the public service and disciplining
according to commercial and market competition along with
The Entrepreneurial School Within Strategic
the production of some outputs previously carried out within
Management
the public sector; these are typically peripheral products that
for historical reasons used to be run within the public sector
The...