Drivers and Barriers of Public Innovation in Crime Prevention

Public managers experience a growing demand for innovation. According to the public innovation literature, the barriers and drivers of public innovation are path dependently shaped by institutions. Based on a case study of collaborative innovation in the Danish Crime Prevention Council, the article argues that drivers emerge in a process of reactive sequences and that barriers emerge in a process of increasing returns. Through increasing returns and reactive sequences a mix of institutional elements, rooted in the two dominant steering paradigms of New Public Management (NPM) and Governance, has significantly shaped the Councils ability to innovative.