P29 A bright or dark future for public service co-production? Reflecting on existing challenges and identifying promising solutions

Panel Members & Contact Details

Trui Steen, Professor, KU, Leuven, Belgium. Email: trui.steen@kuleuven.be

Taco Brandsen, Professor, Radboud Universiteit, The Netherlands. Email: taco.brandsen@ru.nl

Rocco Palumbo, Associate Professor, University of Torvergata, Rome, Italy. Email: rocco.palumbo@uniroma2.it

Mariafrancesca Sicilia, Professor, University of Bergamo, Bergamo, Italy. Email: mariafrancesca.sicilia@unibg.it

Summary

This panel critically examines co-production within public services, challenging the assumption that it inherently leads to positive outcomes. It invites contributions that explore the strategic, organisational, and management issues related to the design and implementation of co-production initiatives, with a special focus on their potential adverse effects, unfulfilled promises, and viability across diverse contexts. By addressing these underexplored dimensions, the panel aims to deepen understanding of co-production’s impact on public value, democratic legitimacy, and the ability to tackle complex societal challenges.

Description

In recent years, co-production has attracted growing interest from a wide range of actors, including scholars, public officials, political leaders, and nonprofit practitioners, as evidenced by the increasing number of academic publications and the expanding implementation of co-production initiatives. These initiatives encompass a plurality of practices such as co-commissioning, co-design, co-delivery, and co-assessment, and may involve both collective and individual participation of lay actors.

Despite this rising attention, often driven by the belief that co-production inherently leads to positive outcomes, several aspects remain underexplored. Review studies have pointed out that research on the actual effects of co-production is underdeveloped. Moreover, empirical research falls short in providing a thick and comprehensive account of failed initiatives aimed at activating co-production. Finally, yet importantly, little is known about the potential adverse effects of co-production, which could harm – rather than improve – the exchange between people and public sector entities. This knowledge gap contrasts with a normative tendency towards optimism that characterizes both research and practice. Therefore, this panel welcomes papers that critically explore diverse challenges related to co-production, including, but not limited to, its processes, outputs, and outcomes, such as:

• Organisational challenges of different types of co-production (digital versus non-digital; individual versus collective; synchronous or asynchronous)
• Outcomes of coproduction, including public value creation as well as unfulfilled promises and unexpected adverse effects;
• The challenges and pitfalls encountered by co-production agents in the generation of relevant impacts and the co-creation of public value;
• Methodologies and techniques for the reliable measurement and evaluation of co-production;
• The long-term implications of co-production and its (institutional and managerial) viability over time;
• The performance multidimensionality related to the multifacetedness of co-production initiatives;
• The unavoidable interplay between co-production outcomes and co-production contents;
• The contibution of co-production in addressing the crisis in (representative) democracy and increasing trust in government and legitimacy of democracy;
• The role of co-production in fulfilling promises of improving public service quality;
• The extent to which co-production concurs in overcoming grand societal challenges and wicked problems related to socio-demographic, green and digital transition.

Any research strategy and study design is welcome, as long as it effectively addresses the issues at hand and rigorously adheres to the methodology adopted, be it theoretical or empirical.

Relevance

This panel is highly relevant to scholars and practitioners, focusing on an original and provocative way topic that falls at the intersection of public administration and management. The proposed panel completely fits the theme of the 2026 IRSPM conference, as it seeks to encourage researchers to problematize the multifaceted phenomenon of co-production that, in recent years, has often been viewed either as an innovation in itself or as a driver of innovation in public management. Co-production is frequently associated with the ability to leverage diverse forms of knowledge, bridging perspectives from both public actors and citizens, facilitating innovation, and enhancing both individual and collective wellbeing. Moreover, with the legitimacy of governments at all levels being under pressure, co-production is often addressed as engagement in small-scale initiatives that may hold the potential of rebuilding citizens’ trust in public administration.

This panel aims to move beyond normative assumptions by critically examining whether, to what extent, and under what conditions co-production contributes to the development of more resilient, innovative and  responsive public service systems. Research insights collected by this panel may speak not only to scholars studying citizen co-production, but also to practitioners working in public, nonprofit and hybrid organisations interested in understanding the innovation and democratic potential of co-commissioning, co-design, co-delivery, and co-assessment practices.