Abstract

This paper assesses the influence of the New Public Management paradigm on the reform process of the Chilean civil service. I follow Peter Hall's three approaches to study the role of public ideas in economic policymaking. I add a fourth: the idea-centered approach, which seeks to explain neomanagerialism on its own merits as a cohesive and significant public idea. The state-centered approach shows the constraints that civil service institutions pose for the proposals of reform: the high number of political appointments is the most important obstacle remaining for the development of a career civil service. The economist-centered approach clarifies the influence of Chilean technocrats in framing the paradigm within the country's context. Lastly, the coalition-centered approach explains the politics of reform. I show that labor-management cooperation was essential for the advancement of a performance-based compensation system, which is a key neomanagerial feature. The study concludes that, while maintaining the fundamental tenets of neomanagerialism, the final national result confirms the existence of divergent reform strategies. © 2002 Information Age Publishing Inc. All rights reserved.