ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the philosophical paradigms and dynamic forces that influence the notion of ‘public enterprise’. It discusses the historical and sometimes uneasy relations between ‘public enterprise’ and ‘local government’ in applying interventionist enterprising policies. The chapter describes the extent to which innovation and collaboration are supported or constrained by the practice of New Public Enterprise, and the differing ways in which sub-national government might facilitate or inhibit public enterprise activity. Public enterprise draws from disparate interdisciplinary and intersectional work that attempts to cross the frontiers of public and private sector debate. Fundamental to the challenges of public enterprise, innovation, public policy and public management, scholars show their unease with pluralist and dualist forms that offer blended public and marketplace terminologies. Successful innovation in public enterprise is present in innovative modes of governance which, as R. Hambleton discusses, ‘span across the divide between state and civil society’.
