Over the last two decades the UK public sector has seen the introduction of 'new
managerialism' - the devolvement to the local level of management initiatives and
techniques more traditionally associated with the private sector; this has arguably
increased industrial relations tensions in the workplace as both line managers and
workers have become involved in actions and negotiations new to them.
This thesis provides a unique, in-depth, consideration of the impact on industrial relations
of new managerialism in a 'failing' secondary comprehensive school; it identifies how
devolved management and public accountability has inflamed the workplace industrial
relations of that school. By taking a qualitative, multi-method, case study approach to the
research, the thesis investigates at first hand how management and teachers respond to
centralised government initiatives at the school level. It considers, and contributes to, the
debate surrounding the extent of managerial autonomy that public sector managers have
and how managers may take differing approaches - and achieve different results - when
implementing new managerialist initiatives at the local level.
As a study of workplace industrial relations, the thesis, engages with and significantly
contributes to, the academic literature stressing the importance of local trade union
leadership to trade union activity; indeed, the work furthers the debate concerning the
inter-relationship between political and trade union activism and the importance of
political factions within trade unions, areas which are under-researched. By exploring the
tensions between trade union members and their official union representatives, the thesis
examines the complex inter-relationship between union democracy and union
bureaucracy.
Finally, the case study identifies policy implications for both the government and the
trade union, particularly with respect to the closing and re-opening of 'failing' schools