Governing through value: public service and the asset rationale

The financial and managerial transformations that are frequently associated with New Public Management include among their prime rationales and key vehicles for implementation the transition from standards of public ‘expenditure’ to principles of public ‘investment’. This transition implies an emphasis on the ‘return’ of public money and on the assessment of its capacity to ‘create value’. The investment rationale that these transformations entail deserves further scrutiny. Considering something in the terms of an ‘asset’, i.e. in its capacity to create value from the perspective of an ‘investor’, involves not only a transformation of the thing/service under consideration. It redefines also the role and subjectivity of public service users and providers. It thus changes relations between government, citizens and regulation, and it leads to a redefining of understandings of democratic accountability.