Lean Production in Public Services: Selective Transfer and Jurisdictional Conflicts

Lean production has spread to public services, even in countries and institutions for a long time reluctant towards a managerial approach. The French State agency in charge of the “modernization of the State” (DGME) perceived it as an efficient tool to implement State reforms. How understanding this focus at the French State level on lean system? How was it re-appropriated by the Ministry of Justice, where other tools (such as ISO standards) had just been experimented, so much so that lean management is about to be generalized in the civil judiciary system?

My hypothesis is that lean system was a means for transversal ministries such as the Ministry of Finance (to which the DGME reported) to reaffirm their power on specialized ministries and impulse reforms otherwise than by budget cuts.

Moreover lean production was implemented in the judiciary by emphasizing its “soft side” (considering a court ruling as a collective work) and by presenting the efficiency goal in a positive way (reducing the wastes of time to focus on the core business of clerks and lawyers). This selective transfer was facilitated by the fact that the DGME supported its cost and that there were no staff cutbacks in the Ministry of Justice.

The paper will show how the success of lean production relies on its adaptability (the selection of some characteristics), its capacity to be compatible with values of diverse professions (even though it may generate jurisdictional conflicts with consultants or between professions when the division of labor is modified), and on strategic uses made by professional groups and political actors.

Studying lean system in public services requires therefore to associate sociology of work and a political sociology perspective. This empirical study at national and local levels is based on observations and interviews with bureaucrats, lawyers and clerks.