Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T23:40:45.090Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Incremental Budgeting: Antecedents of Change*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Royston Greenwood
Royston Greenwood
Affiliation:
Institute of Local Government StudiesUniversity of Birmingham
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The article examines the variables which preclude or facilitate shifts or change in patterns of budgeting within governments. Emphasis is placed upon the connection between systems of budgeting and underlying structures of ideas and values which constitute organisational ‘myths’. Drawing upon the literatures of political science and organisational analysis the paper identifies a combination of factors which facilitate the erosion of the legitimacy of prevailing myths and lead to their displacement. This thesis is empirically examined using data from twenty English local authorities.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Public Policy , Volume 4 , Issue 4 , November 1984 , pp. 277 - 306
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1984

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Aiken, M., Bacharach, S. B. and French, J. L. (1980) Organizational structure, work process, and proposal making in administrative bureaucracies, Academy of Management Journal, 23, 631–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Allison, G. T. (1971) Essence of Decision, Boston: Little, Brown.Google Scholar
Anton, T. J. (1960) The Politics of State Expenditure in Illinois. University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Argyris, C. and Schon, D. (1978) Organizational Learning: A Theory of Action Perspective. Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley.Google Scholar
Bailey, J. J. and O'Connor, R. J. (1975) Operationalizing incrementalism: measuring the muddles, Public Administration Review, (Jan–Feb), 335–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bains Committee (1972) The New Local Authorities. London: HMSO.Google Scholar
Beyer, J. M. (1981) Ideologies, values and decision making in organizations. in Nystrom, P. C. and Starbuck, W. (ed.), Handbook of Organizational Design, New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Binder, B. J. A. (1982) Relations between central and local government since 1975 – arc the associations failing?, Local Government Studies, 8(1), 35–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bozeman, B. and Slusher, E. A. (1980) Scarcity and environmental stress in public organizations: a conjectural essay, Administration and Society.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bunce, V. (1981) Do New Leaders Make a Difference? Princeton: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burns, T. (1977) The BBC: Public Institution and Private World. London: Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chapman, R. A. (1984) Administrative culture and personnel management: the British Civil Service in the 1980s, Teaching Public Administration, 4 (1), 1–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clark, B. R. (1972), The organisational saga in higher education, Administrative Science Quarterly, 17, 178–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clegg, S. and Dunkerley, D. (1980) Organization, Class and Control. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Cowart, A. T. and Brofoss, K. E. (1979) Decision, Politics and Change: A Study of Norwegian Urban Budgeting. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget.Google Scholar
Dalton, M. (1964) Men Who Manage. New York: Wiley.Google Scholar
Danziger, J. N. (1976) Assessing incrementalism in British municipal budgeting, British Journal of Political Science, (07), 335–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Danziger, J. N. (1978) Making Budgets: Public Resource Allocation. London: Sage.Google Scholar
David, S. M. and Kantor, P. (1980) Political theory and transformations in urban budgetary areas: the case of New York City. in Marshal, D. R. (ed.), Urban Policy Making, London: Sage.Google Scholar
Davies, E. M., Gibson, J. G., Game, C. H. and Stewart, J. D. (1983) Grant Characteristics and Central-Local Relations. Institute of Local Government Studies, University of Birmingham.Google Scholar
Deal, T. and Kennedy, A. A. (1982) Corporate Cultures. California: Addison-Wesley.Google Scholar
Donaldson, G. and Lorsch, J. W. (1983) Decision Making at the Top: The Shaping of Strategic Direction. New York, Basic Books.Google Scholar
Eddison, P. A. (1978) Local Government: Management and Corporate Planning. London: Leonard Hill.Google Scholar
Fiske, D. (1975) Education: The Cuckoo in the Local Government Nest. Lady Simon of Wythenshawe Memorial Lectures: Manchester.Google Scholar
Friedman, L. B. (1975) Budgeting Municipal Expenditures: A Study in Comparative Policy Making. Praeger.Google Scholar
Fry, B. and Winters, R. F. (1971) The politics of redistribution, American Political Science Review, 64, 508–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gist, J. R. (1974) Mandatory Expenditures and the Defence Sector: Theory of Budgetary lncrementalism. London: Sage Professional Paper, Vol. 2.Google Scholar
Goodman, P. S. and Associates (1982) Change in Organizations. London: Jossey-Bass.Google Scholar
Gouldner, A. W. (1954) Patterns of Industrial Bureaucracy. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Greenwood, R. (1982a), Pressures from Whitehall. in Rose, R. and Page, E. (eds.), Fiscal Stress in Cities, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Greenwood, R. (1982b) The politics of central-local relations in England and Wales, 1974–81, West European Politics, 253–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Greenwood, R. (1983) Changing patterns of budgeting in English local authorities, Public Administration(Summer).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Greenwood, R., Hinings, C. R. and Ranson, S. (1975) Contingency theory and the organization of local authorities: Part I: Differentiation and integration, Public Administration, (Spring), 1–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Greenwood, R., Hinings, C. R., Ranson, S., Walsh, K. and Lomer, M. (1976) In Pursuit of Corporate Rationality, University of Birmingham: Institute of Local Government Studies.Google Scholar
Greenwood, R., Hinings, C. R. and Ranson, S. (1977) Politics of budgetary process, English Local Government Political Studies, 25 (03), 25–47.Google Scholar
Greenwood, R., Hillings, C. R., Ranson, S. and Walsh, K. (1980) Incremental budgeting and the assumption of growth: The experience of local government. in Wright, M. (ed.), Public Spending Decisions: Growth and Restraint in the 1970s, London: Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Greenwood, R. and Hinings, C. R. (1985) Organizational paradigms, institutional specifics and tracks: towards a theory of quantum change, submitted to Academy of Management Journal.Google Scholar
Greenwood, R. and Stewart, J. D. (1971) Corporate Planning in English Local Government. London: Charles Knight.Google Scholar
Heclo, H. and Wildavsky, A. (1974), The Private Government of Public Money, London: MacMillan.Google Scholar
Hedberg, B. (1981) How organizations learn and unlearn. in Nystrom, P. C. and Starbuck, W. H. (eds.), Handbook of Organizational Design, Vol. 1, New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hedberg, B. and Jonsson, S. (1978) Designing semiconfusing information systems for organizations in changing environments, Accounting Organizations and Society, 3(1), 47–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hedberg, B., Nystrom, P. C. and Starbuck, W. H. (1976) Camping on see-saws: prescriptions for a self-designing organization, Administrative Science Quarterly, 21, 41–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hickson, D. J., Hinings, C. R., Lee, C. A., Schneck, R. E. and Pennings, J. M. (1971) A ‘strategic contingencies’ theory of intraorganizational power, Administrative Science Quarterly, 16, 216–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hinings, C. R, Greenwood, R. and Ranson, S. (1975) Contingency theory and the organization of local authorities: Part II: Contingencies and structure, Public Administration, (Summer), 169–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hinings, C. R., Greenwood, R. and Ranson, S. (1980) Management Systems in Local Government, University of Birmingham: Institute of Local Government Studies.Google Scholar
Hinings, C. R., Greenwood, R., Ranson, S. and Walsh, K. (1980) The organizational consequences of financial restraint in local government. in Wright, M. (ed.), Public Spending Decisions, Growth and Restraint in the 1970s, London: Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Hinings, C. R., Hickson, D. J., Pennings, J. M. and Schneck, R. E. (1974) Structural conditions of intraorganizational power, Administrative Science Quarterly, 19, 22–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kramer, F. A. (1975) Policy analysis as ideology, Public Administration Review, (Sept/Oct), 509–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lindblom, C. E. (1965) The Policy Making Process. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Lindblom, C. E. (1959) The ‘science’ of muddling through, Public Administration Review, 19, 79–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lomer, M. (1977) The chief executive in local government, 1974–76, Local Government Studies, (October)CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lyden, F. J. and Miller, E. G. (1978) Public Budgeting: Program Planning and Evaluation. Chicago: Rand McNally.Google Scholar
McKenney, J. L. (1978) A Field Research Study of Organizational Learning, Working Paper No. 78–23. Boston: Graduate School of Business Administration, Harvard University.Google Scholar
March, J. G. and Olsen, J. (1976) Ambiguity and Choice in Organizations. Bergen: Universitetsforlaget.Google Scholar
Meyer, A. D. (1982a), How ideologies supplant formal structures and shape responses to environments, Journal of Management Studies, 19 01 1982, 45–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meyer, A. D. (1982b), Adapting to environmental jolts, Administrative Science Quarterly, (12) 515–37.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Midwinter, A. (1984) Budgetary reform in local government: A political analysis. Paper prepared for Conference on Governmental Budget under Stress: Perspectives and Analysis, University of Manchester, 18–19 May 1984.Google Scholar
Miles, R. H. and Cameron, K. S. (1982) Coffin Nails and Corporate Strategies. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Miles, R. H. and Randolph, W. A. (1980) Influence of organizational learning styles on early development. In Kimberly, J. R., Miles, R. H. and Associates, The Organizational Life Cycle. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.Google Scholar
Miller, D. and Friesen, P. H. (1980) Momentum and revolution in organizational adaptation, Academy of Management Journal, 23, 591–614.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, D. and Friesen, P. H. (1984) Organizations: A Quantum View. Englewood Cliffs. NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Mintzberg, H. (1983) Designing Effective Organizations. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Mitroff, I. and Emshoff, J. R.(1976) On strategic assumption-making: a dialectical approach to policy and planning, Academy of Management Review, 4(1), 1–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mitrofl, I. and Kilmann, R. (1976) On organisational stories. In Kilman, R. et al. (eds.), The Management of Organisational Design: Volume 1, Strategies and Implementation, New York: Elsevier. 184–208.Google Scholar
Mohr, L. B. (1982) Explaining Organizational Behaviour. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.Google Scholar
Natchez, P. B. and Bupp, I. C. (1973) Policy and priority in the budgetary process, American Political Science Review, 67, 951–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Normann, R. (1971) Organizational innovativeness: product variation and reorientation, Administrative Science Quarterly, 16, 203–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nystrom, P. C., Hedberg, B. L. T. and Starbuck, W. H. (1976) Interacting processes as organization designs. In Kilman, R. H., Pondy, L. R. and Slevin, D. P. (eds.), The Management of Organization Design, Vol. 1. New York: North Holland.Google Scholar
Padgett, J. F. (1980) Bounded rationality in budgetary research, American Political Science Review, 74, 354–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Peters, T. J. and Waterman, R. H. (1982) In Search of Excellence. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Pettigrew, A. (1973) The Politics of Organizational Decision Making. London: Tavistock.Google Scholar
Pettigrew, A. (1979) On studying organizational cultures, Administrative Science Quarterly, 24, 570–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pfeffer, J. (1981a) Power in Organizations. London: Pitman.Google Scholar
Pfeffer, J. (1981b), Management as symbolic action: the creation and maintenance of organizational paradigms. In Cummings, L. L. and Straw, B. M. (eds.), Research in Organizational Behaviour, JAI Press, Vol. 3, 1–52.Google Scholar
Pfeffer, J. and Salancik, G. (1974) Organizational decision making as a political process: the case of a university budget, Administrative Science Quarterly, 19, 135–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pfefler, J. and Salancik, G. (1978) The External Control of Organizations. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Phyrr, P. (1977) The zero-based approach to government budgeting, Public Administration Review, (January–February).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pitt, D. C. and Smith, B. C. (1981) Government Departments. An Organizational Perspective. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Pollitt, C. (1984) Manipulating the Machine. London: Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Raine, J. (1981) Introduction. In Raine, J. (ed.), In Defence of Local Government. University of Birmingham: Institute of Local Government Studies.Google Scholar
Rainey, H. G., Backoff, W. R. and Levine, C. H. (1976) Comparing public and private organizations, Public Administration Review, 36, 233–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ranson, S. et al. (1980) The structuring of organizational structures, Administrative Science Quarterly, 25 (03), 1–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosenberg, D. (1984) Professional authority and resource allocation: Treasurers and politics in UK local relations. Paper prepared for Conference on Governmental Budget under Stress: Perspectives and Analysis, University of Manchester, 18–19 May 1984.Google Scholar
Schick, A. (1980) Budgetary adaptations to resource scarcity. In Levine, C. H. and Rubin, I. (eds.), Fiscal Stress and Public Policy. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Selznick, P. (1957) Leadership in Administration: A Sociological Interpretation. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Sharkansky, I. and Turnbull, G. (1969) Budget-making in Georgia and Wisconsin: a test of a model, Midwest Journal of Political Science, (11), 185–214.Google Scholar
Siehl, C. and Martin, J. (1984) Measuring organizational culture. Paper presented to Western Academy of Management, Vancouver, British Columbia (April, 1984).Google Scholar
Simon, H. A. (1945) Administrative Behaviour. New York: Free Press, 1965 edition.Google Scholar
Skelcher, C. (1981) From programme budgeting to policy analysis: corporate approaches in local government, Public Administration, (Summer).Google Scholar
Skitt, J. (1975) Practical Corporate Planning in Local Government. London: Leonard Hill.Google Scholar
Sloan, A. (1964) My Years with General Motors. New York: MacFadden.Google Scholar
Starbuck, W. (1976) Organizations and their environments. In Duanette, M. D. (ed.), Handbook of Industrial and Organizational Psychology, Chicago: Rand McNally, 1069–123.Google Scholar
Starbuck, W. (1983) Organizations as action generators, American Sociological Review, 02, 91–102.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Starbuck, W. and Dutton, J. M. (1973) Designing adaptive organizations, Journal of Business Policy, 3(4), 21–28.Google Scholar
Starbuck, W., Greve, H. A. and Hedberg, B. L. T. (1978) Responding to crisis, Journal of Business Administration, 9, 111–37.Google Scholar
Starbuck, W. and Nystrom, P. C. (1982) Pursuing organizational effectiveness that is ambiguously specified. In Cameron, K. and Whetten, D. (eds.) Organizational Effectiveness: A Comparison of Multiple Models, Academic Press.Google Scholar
Stewart, J. D. (1971) Management in Local Government. London: Charles Knight.Google Scholar
Stewart, J. D. (1980) Assumptions of growth. In Wright, M.W. (ed.), Public Spending Decisions: Growth and Restraint in the 1970s, London: Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Stewart, J. D. (1983) Local Government: The Conditions of Local Choice. London: Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Stewart, J. D. and Jones, G. W. (1983) The Treasury and local government, Political Quarterly, 54(1), 5–15.Google Scholar
Thompson, J. D. and Tuden, A. (1959) Strategies, structures, and processes of organizational decision. In Thompson, J. D., Hammond, P. B., Hawkes, R. W., Junker, B. H. and Tuden, A. (eds.), Comparative Studies in Administration. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 195–216.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tung, R. (1979) Dimensions of organizational environments: An exploratory study of their impact on organization structure, Academy of Management Journal. (12), pp. 672–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walsh, K., Hinings, B., Greenwood, R. and Ranson, S. (1981) Power and advantage in organizations, Organization Studies, 2(2), 131–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Warwick, D. P. (1975) A Theory of Public Bureaucracy. London: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Weick, K. E. (1969) The Social Psychology of Organizing. Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley.Google Scholar
Weick, K. E. (1977) Enactment processes in organizations. In Straw, B. M. and Salancik, G. R. (eds.), New Directions in Organizational Behaviour. Chicago: St Clair Press.Google Scholar
Weick, K. E. (1979) Cognitive processes in organizations. In Straw, B. M. (ed.), Research in Organizational Behaviour, Greenwich, Conn.: JAI Press, Vol. 1, 41–74.Google Scholar
Wildavsky, A. (1964) The Politics of the Budgetary Process. Boston: Little, Brown.Google Scholar
Wildavsky, A. (1975) Budgeting: A Comparative Theory of the Budgetary Process. Boston: Little, Brown.Google Scholar
Wildavsky, A. (1978) A Budget for all seasons?: Why the traditional budget lasts, Public Administration Review, (Nov/Dec), 501–09.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilensky, H. (1967) Organizational Intelligence. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar