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Public Organiz Rev (2014) 14:419438
DOI 10.1007/s11115-013-0239-6
Fabrice Hamelin & Vincent Spenlehauer
Published online: 31 May 2013# Springer Science+Business Media New York 2013
Abstract How can a specialized public organization, of which the operational sector has been brutally fragmented and privatized, maintain its unity and publicness? The paper looks at how the British Transport Police (BTP) has adapted to the fragmentation and privatization of British Rail since 1993. The fact that the BTP has remained public and national is all the more surprising since a return to the pre-World War II configuration, with each Train Operating Company (TOC) having and running its own police, could be technically envisaged. The answer to the initial question is quite simple. The police organization under examination has intelligently reinvented its publicness, with the negotiated assent of its referring political and economic authorities.
Keywords Publicness . Organizational change . Security governance . British Transport Police
Everything changes so that nothing changesG. Tomasi di Lampedusa, The Leopard
Introduction
How can a specialized public organization, of which the operational sector has been brutally and totally fragmented and privatized, maintain its publicness and also its unity? This paper will address the question through a case study of the British Transport Police (BTP), the public organization in charge of policing the British
F. Hamelin (*)
Department for Planning, Mobility and Environment, Universit Paris Est - IFSTTAR, 14-20 Boulevard Newton, Champs sur Marne, 77447 Marne-la-Valle Cedex 2, France e-mail: [email protected]
V. Spenlehauer
Educative Division in Public Policy of the Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chausses - LATTS Research Center, Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chausses, 6 et 8 avenue Blaise-Pascal, Champs sur Marne, 77455 Marne-la-Valle Cedex 2, France
Managing to Reinvent Strong Publicness in a Privatized World
420 F. Hamelin, V. Spenlehauer
railway system. The research was conducted 12 years after the fragmentation and privatization of British Rail in 1993. Empirically, the question is how the British Transport Police (BTP), despite the fragmentation and privatization of British Rail, has remained public, national and united.
The answer to this question is quite simple. During the decade following the major turning point of 1993, the police organization under examination has reinvented its publicness, with the help and the assent of both its referring external political authorities,...