ABSTRACT

This article explores how agencification, in terms of increasing arm's length governance, may influence governance control with municipal service-provision if the principal and the agent develop different institutional logics. The basic expectation is that structural separation between principal and agent will challenge the principal’s control of the agent, and that this challenge will be accentuated if the structural change also leads to cultural separation, conceptualised as different institutional logics. Our findings lead to the conclusion that the relationship between formal structure and institutional logics is reciprocal; structural separation creates a separation in culture and identity, thereby accentuating the perceived distance between principal and agent, which stimulates their sense of belonging to different types of organisations. Still, development of appropriate control mechanisms is in its infancy. Formally, output control exists, but receives scarce political attention. Informal control may also work depending on adherence to a common community logic.

摘要

本文探讨了如果委托人和代理人制定不同的制度逻辑，从增加独立治理的角度来看，代理化如何影响市政服务提供的治理控制。基本预期是，委托人和代理人之间的结构性分离将挑战委托人对代理人的控制，如果结构变化也导致文化分离（概念化为不同的制度逻辑），那么这种挑战将会加剧。我们的研究结果得出这样的结论：形式结构和制度逻辑之间的关系是相互的；结构性分离造成了文化和身份上的分离，从而加剧了委托人和代理人之间的感知距离，从而激发了他们对不同类型组织的归属感。尽管如此，适当控制机制的发展仍处于起步阶段。从形式上看，产出控制是存在的，但很少受到政治关注。非正式控制也可能取决于对共同社区逻辑的遵守而发挥作用。