ilanthropic interest), but in comparisons of private and public management, "private" is effectively synonymous with for-profit firms, and this discussion will regard them as equivalent.
Broadly speaking, there are two ways in which public agencies and private firms -- and, therefore, public and private management -- can be regarded as different. On the one hand, public agencies can be regarded as serving a higher purpose, namely the public good, rather than simply making money for someone. The phrase "public service ethos" implies such a higher purpose.
On the other hand, public agencies can be regarded as sheltered from the competitive pressures that act on private firms, and thus lacking the motivation for improving efficiency that a competitive marketplace is presumed to generate. The word "bureaucrat," with its negative connotations, encapsulates this latter distinction, in which public agencies are viewed as inherently less efficient -- and public management, at least good public management, as inherently more difficult -- than private agencies and management.
In the English-speaking nations, with their traditions of limited government and suspicion of governmental authority, the latter presumption tends to predominate, with public servants and managers not having the aura of state authority they enjoy in many other societies. This attitude is reinforced by the perception that (for example) civil-service regulations make it harder to discipline or fire public employees, presumably making the public manager's task more difficult.
At the same time, people tend to expect more of public agencies. In the words of one observer, for instance, "Americans want the public service to do the impossible" (Light, 1999, p. 21). People want more or better public services, but they also want lower taxes, thus less funding for the agencies that provide those services. This would make the public manager's task more difficult...