Public Service Delivery

PAR — 2026-09-10 Original Investor Orientation and Commitment in Outcomes‐Based Public Service Contracts

PAR — 2026-08-20 Original Expansive Public Service Delivery: Advancing Public Value Governance Mary K. Feeney, Julie Langer, Justin M. Stritch Abstract ABSTRACT Public administration has traditionally emphasized the normative ideal that public agencies have a responsibility to improve the lives of communities through public service delivery. We turn to public libraries to explore possibilities for what we call Expansive Public Service Delivery. Expansive Public Service Delivery is defined by a mission to serve all, professional and ethical responsibilities, and proactive responsiveness through outreach and (re)assessment. Public libraries have long aimed to improve communities and advance democracy by providing open, free information access to all. Today, they also proactively seek to expand their services to underserved groups ensuring their relevance and mission achievement. This research draws from 25 in‐depth qualitative interviews to explore librarian narratives to identify four core responsibilities that constitute Expansive Public Service Delivery. We conclude with a discussion of how service for all, professionalism, ethical responsibility, and reflexive decision‐making around community needs can result in more vibrant, sustainable public organizations.

GOV 39/4 2026-07-19 Original Breaking Out of Low‐Effort Traps: Bureaucratic Leadership by Persuasion Martin Haus

PMR — pp. 1-24 2026-07-16 Original Whose responsibility is it anyway? Unpacking prevention during service delivery to support value co-creation Kirsty Strokosch, Michael J. Roy, Jennifer McLean

PMR — pp. 1-28 2026-05-31 Original A sense of responsibility: factors affecting individuals’ participation in coproduction delivery

JPART 36/3 pp. 361-377 2026-05-07 Original Who is this for? How felt accountability shapes the enactment of accountability in public service delivery Margit Ernst Abstract Abstract What makes accountability work? To answer this question, public administration research has long focused on formal mechanisms—–rules, audits, and performance indicators—intended to ensure that public employees answer for their actions. Yet these mechanisms alone rarely determine how accountability plays out in practice. Rather, it depends on how they are recognized, internalized, and enacted by those expected to comply. This realization has spurred growing interest in how employees perceive and enact accountability in the context of public service delivery. Based on ethnographic fieldwork, this study unpacks how street-level bureaucrats navigate tensions between formal accountability demands and their internalized perceptions of accountability. The findings reveal how employees weigh, reinterpret, or reframe accountability based on what they perceive to be at stake. To conceptualize this, the article introduces a concentric model of accountability.