Public management and organizational performance: The case of law enforcement agencies

Investigating the impact of management on performance in public organizations is a key challenge for public administration. To that end, we apply to a national sample of law enforcement agencies a recently developed formal model of public management. The model frames a set of specific expectations about the management-performance relationship. The study estimates the impacts of both internally- and externally-oriented managerial activities on a salient metric of law enforcement outcomes. In results supportive of the model, the findings indicate that active internal management contributes to higher arrest rates and helps police departments to be less bound by previous performance. The analysis also indicates that departments' externally-oriented activities of networking and community policing improve arrest rates and assist managers in mitigating the impact of environmental constraints on results.