By contrast, the strength of NPM has been in its ability to address precisely the
complexities of this black box, though with an equally irritating tendency to see the
public policy process as simply a ‘context’ within which the essential task of public
management takes place. In its most extreme form, the NPM has even questioned the
legitimacy of public policy as a context for public management, arguing that it imposes
unreasonable democratic constraints onto the management and provision of public
services (Meier 1997). Most damagingly, though, is that the NPM has become
perceived as limited and one-dimensional in its ability to capture and contribute to the
management and governance of public services and of Public Service Organizations
(PSOs) – whether situated in the public, private or voluntary sector – in an increasingly
plural and pluralist world (Rhodes 1997).