The End of Publicness?

Abstract

When Wallace Sayre declared that ‘public and private organizations are alike in all unimportant respects' a quest began to establish the truth or otherwise of this assertion. Researchers have been investigating the topic for over sixty years. They have focused on two key questions; what is meant by a public or private organization? And what constitute ‘important respects' and ‘unimportant respects' respectively? This paper reviews current evidence relating to the testing of Sayre's statement, focusing on the healthcare sector. It is concluded that research has failed to provide unequivocal evidence that particular aspects of publicness impact aspects of organizational performance in particular ways. Sayre got it wrong; public and private organizations are alike in all important respects. It is argued that it is time to call a halt to publicness studies; what matters is management and organization, and it is on these issues that public organization researchers should now concentrate.