Contracting for social cohesion: do local area agreements make a difference?

Andrews, Rhys William ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1904-9819, Downe, James Daniel ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0772-3183 and Guarneros-Meza, Valeria 2011. Contracting for social cohesion: do local area agreements make a difference? Presented at: Annual Conference of the EGPA 2011: PSG II: Performance in Public Sector, Bucharest, Romania, 7-10 September 2011. Proceedings of the Public Sector Performance study Group EGPA 2011. European Group of Public Administration,

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Abstract

Under the Labour government, Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) in England were responsible for the delivery of Local Area Agreements (LAAs) – agreed targets between central and local government on key outcomes for local people. This paper uses multivariate statistical techniques to explore the impact of such targets on the efforts of LSPs to promote social cohesion. The results suggest that LSPs with an LAA for social cohesion experienced a better rate of improvement in levels of community cohesiveness than those without. The results were starker for LSPs with tougher cohesion targets, with the degree of toughness seemingly prompting LSPs to make even greater advances in promoting social cohesion. Our findings therefore suggest that performance contracts may be an effective tool for improving outcomes for local people, especially when they set challenging targets for public service providers.

Item Type:	Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Business (Including Economics)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HN Social history and conditions. Social problems. Social reform
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Social cohesion, targets, partnership, local government, empirical analysis
Publisher:	European Group of Public Administration
Last Modified:	18 Oct 2022 14:02
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/16266

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