Peter Squires suggests that I've searched the archives "for occasions where
similar phrases have been employed before." That isn't what I was doing; I
was looking at the substance. The kind of 'multi-agency' working which
both Peter and Tim have referred to is clearly foreshadowed both by
corporate planning, largely a movement of the 1970s, and the joint working
initiatives of the 1970s, which drew in statutory and voluntary services in
partnerships, particularly in health and personal social services. This
gained a new lease of life with the development of community care plans in
the early 1990s, which drew in a wide range of actors.
I'd go further. In principle, many of the reforms of the 1980s, including
community care, were concerned with marketisation; and in theory, this was
supposed to supersede old-fashioned concerns with planning, coordination and
liaison with a sleek, shiny market model, where smoothly purring market
signals would replace clunky bureaucratic committees. In practice, the
market reforms failed to address many of the issues which services were
concerned with on the ground. In some places, this led to administrative
chaos; in others, it led to a revival of the methods which people knew to
work, including liaison officers, joint groups and partnerships. In
Scotland, there has been a renewed interest in corporate planning and
rational planning techniques.
PS: Why am I in the blue corner?
Paul Spicker
University of Dundee
Dundee DD1 4HN
Scotland
Tel: + 44 1382 344929
Fax: + 44 1382 344675
Website: http://www.dundee.ac.uk/politics/socialpolicy
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