Leadership development interventions in context

AbstractThe chapter describes the main contextual factors that prompted the United Kingdom (UK) Labour government to invest in the suite of national leadership development interventions, concentrating on public-funded school education and healthcare, and on partly public-funded higher education (HE). Foremost is the subscription of elites in successive governments since the 1980s to the economic and political ideology of neoliberalism, supported by managerialism, generating a process of neoliberalization which extended to the regulated marketization of public services. This process challenged the ideology of professionalism and individual autonomy in service provision holding sway within most public services since the advent of the Keynesian welfare state. The associated process of neoliberalization is tracked to the point of the Labour government’s engagement with the interventions. A major motivator is shown to be government politicians’ acknowledged dependence on senior staff in public service organizations to implement the regulated marketization reform programme and operate the reformed services.