Reinventing public purpose

ABSTRACT

The "big three” management consultancies (McKinsey, Boston Consulting Group [BCG], and Bain & Company) and the "big four” accountancies-consultants (PwC, Deloitte, KPMG, and EY) are seemingly ubiquitous. In the UK, their increased presence coincided with, and may have contributed to, increasing disdain over the role of the state and distrust of the public sector. In Sweden, for example, in the over-budget NKS project, BCG consultants charged an estimated Kr700 000 a month for each of nine consultants, "multiples more than public sector managers of similar rank and education are paid in Sweden”. The neoliberal order, by contrast, was grounded in the belief that market forces had to be liberated from government regulatory controls that were stymieing innovation, growth and freedom”, writes Gerstle.