You are here

  1. Home
  2. Dr Elke Loeffler

Dr Elke Loeffler

Profile summary

  • Central Academic Staff
  • Director of Research and Strategic Partnerships
  • The Faculty of Business & Law
  • The Open University Business School
  • Department for Policing
  • elke.loeffler

Professional biography

Dr. Elke Loeffler (Diplomvolkswirtin, M.A. Political Science, M.A. Economics, Ph.D) is a Senior Lecturer and Director of Research and Strategic Partnerships at CPRL. She has undertaken research, executive training and teaching on public management and governance issues in over 30 countries and has worked with many governments, public service organisations and international organisations.

She has published 26 articles in international peer-reviewed journals, 5 sole-authored books, 2 joint authored booked and 8 edited books and 50 book chapters, as well as numerous policy reports for governments around the world. She is the co-editor of the best-selling textbook Public Management and Governance (Routledge, fourth edition published in September 2023). Her published work has over 9000 citations and an impact factor of 43 on Google Scholar. 

Before joining the University of Birmingham and the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, she worked at the OECD in Paris as a policy analyst and was CEO of the non-profit organisation Governance International.

Research interests

Dr. Elke Loeffler’s research interests focus on

  • User and community co-production of public services and outcomes
  • Innovation in public services
  • Public leadership
  • Public governance, with a focus on sustainability and resilience
  • Quantitative and qualitative evaluation of public value and social impact
  • Strategic management for performance and quality improvement

Teaching interests

Dr. Elke Loeffler has extensive experience in teaching public management and governance issues, both face-to-face and online, at the undergraduate and postgraduate levels in the UK and internationally. She has carried out executive education for policy makers and practitioners in governments in the UK and internationally, including programmes for politicians at Cabinet level, top civil servants, local government leaders and chief executives, and third sector leaders and community groups. She a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and co-editor of the widely-used textbook Public Management and Governance - the 4th edition has just been published.

 

Impact and engagement

Elke’s research on user and community co-production and wider governance issues has made a major academic impact, as evidenced by a high citation count on Google Scholar.

She has also had a major impact on policy-makers and public service managers, as shown by her many invitations internationally to give keynote speeches to conferences and seminars. Her four Co’s framework has proved enormously influential in supporting the redesign of Scotland’s health and social care system and was adopted by the Scottish Government’s Joint Improvement Team as the model of choice in embedding co-production into service design and is now the model for an NHS pilot research project in England.  It was also successfully piloted by a German public employment agency and this model is now being used in an EU project to improve employment agency practices in Eastern Europe.

She has used her intense engagement with public services in the UK and internationally to develop a Case Study Hub in Governance International, many of which have been republished on the website of the OECD Open Public Sector Innovation Unit.

She has provided collaborative leadership for achieving research impact in her former role as Associate Dean (Impact) at Strathclyde Business School, where developed the Business School’s Impact Guide.

External collaborations

Dr. Elke Loeffler serves on the Editorial Board of the journals: International Review of Administrative Sciences, Public Money and Management, der moderne staat, Azienda Pubblica and the International Public Management Review.

In September 2022 Elke was appointed to the Steering Group of the European Group of Public Administration (EGPA). She is also a Co-Chair of the EGPA Study Group on Citizen Participation.

In 2023 Elke was appointed as Vice-Chair for Doctoral Research of the newly founded UK Association for Public Administration (UKAPA).

In April 2023 Elke was elected as an ‘at large’ member’ of the Board of the International Research Society for Public Management (IRSPM). 

Recently, Elke served as a Commissioner on the Newham Democracy and Civic Participation Commission and was a member of Independent Review Panel of The Healthcare Improvement Studies Institute at the University of Cambridge.

She has been selected as a Member of the Review College of Research Foundation Flanders (FWO) for another period from 2024-26 and regularly reviews research applications on behalf of national research councils in Europe.

She is an Associate of the Institute of Local Government Studies (INLOGOV) at the University of Birmingham and non-executive Director of Governance International, a nonprofit organisation working throughout Europe and more widely across the world. 

She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

 

Dr. Loeffler has a long track record of delivering executive training and research commissioned by the OECD (SIGMA), UNPD and other international organisations.

She is currently undertaking research on co-production with vulnerable people with colleagues at the University of Sao Paolo and the Dartmouth Institute, USA and the University of Tor Vergata I Rome.

In 2022 Elke was a Visiting Professor at the University of Tor Vergata in Rome.

She also engages with EURAM as a mentor of two international Ph.D. students and is a member of the Academy of Management (AOM), European Academy of Management (EURAM), European Group of Public Administration (EGPA), German Section of the International Institute of Administrative Sciences, International Research Society for Public Management (IRSPM) and the Swiss Society for Public Administration (SGVW).

 

Publications

International survey evidence on user and community co-delivery of prevention activities relevant to public services and outcomes (2023)
Bovaird, Tony; Loeffler, Elke; Yates, Sophie; Van Ryzin, Gregg and Alford, John
Public Management Review, 25(3) (pp. 657-679)

New development: Managing the Covid-19 pandemic-from a hospital-centred model of care to a community co-production approach (2021)
Cepiku, Denita; Giordano, Filippo; Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke
Public Money and Management, 41(1) (pp. 77-80)

Comparing user and community co-production approaches in local 'welfare' and 'law and order' services: Does the governance mode matter? (2021)
Loeffler, Elke and Timm-Arnold, Peter
Public Policy and Administration, 36(1) (pp. 115-137)

Assessing the impact of co-production on pathways to outcomes in public services: the case of policing and criminal justice (2020)
Loeffler, Elke and Bovaird, Tony
International Public Management Journal, 23(2) (pp. 205-223)

How far have we come with co-production-and what's next? (2019)
Bovaird, Tony; Flemig, Sophie; Loeffler, Elke and Osborne, Stephen P.
Public Money and Management, 39(4) (pp. 229-232)

Co-commissioning of public services and outcomes in the UK (2019)
Loeffler, Elke and Bovaird, Tony
Public Money and Management, 39(4) (pp. 241-252)

公共サービスと結果のユーザーとコミュニティの共同制作 日本の高齢化社会に対する新しい機会 (2018)
Loeffler, Elke
Chihou Zaimu (Local Fiscal Affairs), 764 (pp. 119-131)

Co-production of public services and outcomes (2017)
Bovaird, Tony; Fleming, Sophie; Loeffler, Elke and Osborne, Stephen P.
Public Money & Management, 37(5) (pp. 363-364)

Applying a Dynamic Performance Management Framework to Wicked Issues: How Coproduction Helps to Transform Young People’s Services in Surrey County Council, UK (2017)
Bianchi, Carmine; Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke
International Journal of Public Administration, 40(10) (pp. 833-846)

Nachhaltige kommunale Haushaltssicherung durch die Koproduktion öffentlicher Wirkungen mit Bürgerinnen und Bürgern? (2016-12-12)
Loeffler, Elke and Timm-Arnold, Peter
Verwaltung und Management, 22(6) (pp. 306-314)

Activating collective co-production of public services: influencing citizens to participate in complex governance mechanisms in the UK (2016-03)
Bovaird, Tony; Stoker, Gerry; Jones, Tricia; Loeffler, Elke and Pinilla Roncancio, Monica
International Review of Administrative Sciences, 82(1) (pp. 47-68)

Commentary: Coproduction of Public Outcomes: Where Do Citizens Fit In? (2016)
Loeffler, Elke
Public Administration Review, 76(3) (pp. 436-437)

User and Community Co-Production of Public Services: What Does the Evidence Tell Us? (2016)
Loeffler, Elke and Bovaird, Tony
International Journal of Public Administration, 39(13) (pp. 1006-1019)

Activating citizens to participate in collective co-production of public services (2015-01)
Bovaird, T.; Van Ryzin, G. G.; Loeffler, E. and Parrado, S.
Journal of Social Policy, 44(1) (pp. 1-23)

Correlates of Co-production: Evidence From a Five-Nation Survey of Citizens (2013)
Parrado, Salvador; Van Ryzin, Gregg G.; Bovaird, Tony and Löffler, Elke
International Public Management Journal, 16(1) (pp. 85-112)

From Engagement to Co-production: The Contribution of Users and Communities to Outcomes and Public Value (2012-12)
Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke
Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations, 23(4) (pp. 1119-1138)

More quality through competitive quality awards? (2009)
Bovaird, Tony and Löffler, Elke
an impact assessment framework, International Review of Administrative Sciences, 75(3) (pp. 383-401)

Assessing the Quality of Local Governance: A Case Study of Public Services (2007)
Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke
Public Money and Management, 27(4) (pp. 293-300)

Evaluating the quality of public governance (2003)
Bovaird, Tony and Löffler, Elke
indicators, models and methodologies, International Review of Administrative Sciences, 69(3) (pp. 313-328)

Waiting for Godot: The contribution of the European Common Assessment Framework to leadership development in UK local government (2002-12-31)
Loeffler, Elke
Local Governance (pp. 235-244)

Finding a Bowling Partner: The Role of Stakeholders in Activating Civil Society in Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom (2002)
Bovaird, Tony; Löffler, Elke and Parrado-Díez, Salvador
Public Management Review, 4(3) (pp. 411-431)

Moving from excellence models of local service delivery to benchmarking 'good local governance' (2002)
Bovaird, Tony and Löffler, Elke
International Review of Administrative Sciences, 68(1) (pp. 9-24)

Quality awards as a public sector bechmarking concept in OECD member countries: some guidelines for quality award organizers (2001-02)
Loffler, Elke
Public Administration and Development, 21(1) (pp. 27-40)

Best-practice cases reconsidered from an international perspective (2000)
Löffler, Elke
International Public Management Journal, 3(2) (pp. 191-204)

Benchmarking and performance measurement in public sectors (1999)
Kouzmin, Alexander; Loeffler, Elke; Klages, Helmut and Korac-Kakabadse, Nada
International Journal of Public Sector Management, 12(2) (pp. 121-144)

Pay flexibility in the German and British civil services (1998-12-31)
White, Geoff and Loeffler, Elke
Employee Relations Review, 1(4) (pp. 10-16)

Obstacles to the administrative modernization process in Germany (1998)
Klages, Helmut and Löffler, Elke
International Public Management Journal, 1(2) (pp. 165-176)

New public management in Germany (1998)
Klages, Helmut and Löffler, Elke
International Review of Administrative Sciences, 64(1) (pp. 41-54)

Personnel management in German public administration (1997)
Löffler, Elke
Review of Public Personnel Administration, 17(3) (pp. 69-81)

Flexibilities in the German civil service (1997)
Loeffler, Elke
Public Policy and Administration, 12(4) (pp. 73-86)

Administrative Modernization in Germany — A Big Qualitative Jump in Small Steps (1995)
Klages, Helmut and Löffler, Elke
International Review of Administrative Sciences, 61(3) (pp. 373-383)

Co-Production of Public Services and Outcomes (2021)
Loeffler, Elke
ISBN : 978-3-030-55508-5 | Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan | Published : Cham

Liberalisation and Privatisation in the EU: Services of General Interest and the Roles of the Public Sector (2012-10)
Loeffler, Elke; Sobczak, Dominik and Hine-Hughes, Frankie
ISBN : 9781907132384 | Publisher : Multi-Science Publishing | Published : London

Co-production: theoretical roots and conceptual frameworks (2022-02-18)
Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke
In: Ansell, Christopher and Torfing, Jacob eds. Handbook on Theories of Governance. Political Science and Public Policy 2022 (pp. 446-461)
ISBN : 9781800371965 | Publisher : Edward Elgar Publishing | Published : Cheltenham

#WirVsVirus: Communities co-producing new solutions to meet Covid-19 challenges through a hackathon in Germany (2021-05-24)
Loeffler, Elke and Masiga, Claudia
In: Williams, Oli; Tembo, Doreen; Ocloo, Josephine; Kaur, Meerat; Hickey, Gary; Farr, Michelle and Beresford, Peter eds. COVID-19 and Co-production in Health and Social Care Research, Policy, and Practice: Volume 2: Co-production Methods and Working Together at a Distance (pp. 57-65)
ISBN : 9781447361787; 9781447361794 | Publisher : Policy Press | Published : Bristol

Outcome-based commissioning: Four Pathways to Achieving Public Value (2019-12)
Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke
In: Kekez, Anka; Howlett, Michael and Ramesh, M. eds. Collaboration in Public Service Delivery: Promise and Pitfalls (pp. 183-202)
ISBN : 9781788978576 | Publisher : Edward Elgar | Published : Cheltenham, UK

Qualitätsmanagement (2019-10)
Löffler, Elke
In: Veit, Sylvia; Reichard, Christoph and Wewer, Göttrik eds. Handbuch zur Verwaltungsreform (pp. 359-370)
ISBN : 78-3-658-21562-0 | Publisher : Springer VS Wiesbaden | Published : Cham

From Participation to Co-production: Widening and Deepening the Contributions of Citizens to Public Services and Outcomes (2018)
Loeffler, Elke and Bovaird, Tony
In: Ongaro, Edoardo and Van Thiel, Sandra eds. The Palgrave Handbook of Public Administration and Management in Europe (pp. 403-423)
ISBN : 978-1-137-55268-6 | Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan | Published : London

How public services in Sweden help newcomers to integrate in the labour market and society through the digital platform Mobilearn (2018)
Joshi, Somya; Koulolias, Vasilis; Moran, Francisco Garcia and Loeffler, Elke
In: Brandsen, Taco; Steen, Trui and Verschuere, Bram eds. Co-Production and Co-Creation: Engaging Citizens in Public Services (pp. 128-130)
ISBN : 9781138700116 | Publisher : Routledge | Published : Abingdon

Assessing the effect of co-production on outcomes, service quality and efficiency (2018)
Loeffler, Elke and Bovaird, Tony
In: Brandsen, Taco; Steen, Trui and Verschuere, Bram eds. Co-Production and Co-Creation: Engaging Citizens in Public Services (pp. 269-280)
ISBN : 9781138700116 | Publisher : Routledge | Published : Abingdon

Providing public safety and public order through co-production (2018)
Loeffler, Elke
In: Brandsen, Taco; Steen, Trui and Verschuere, Bram eds. Co-Production and Co-Creation Engaging Citizens in Public Services (pp. 211-222)
ISBN : 9781138700116 | Publisher : Routledge | Published : Abingdon

Bringing the Resources of Citizens into Public Governance: Innovation through Co-production to Improve Public Services and Outcomes (2016)
Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke
In: Torfing, Jacob and Triantafillou, Peter eds. Enhancing Public Innovation by Transforming Public Governance (pp. 160-177)
ISBN : 9781107088986 | Publisher : Cambridge University Press | Published : Cambridge

What has co-production ever done for interactive governance? (2016)
Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke
In: Edelenbos, Jurian and van Meerkerk, Ingmar eds. Critical Reflections on Interactive Governance: Self-organization and Participation in Public Governance (pp. 254-277)
ISBN : 978 1 78347 906 1 | Publisher : Edward Elgar Publishing | Published : Cheltenham

Coproducing Public Services with Service Users, Communities, and the Third Sector (2015-02)
Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke
In: Perry, James L. and Christensen, Robert K. eds. Handbook of Public Administration (pp. 235-250)
ISBN : 978-1-119-00432-5 | Publisher : Jossey Bass | Published : San Francisco

User and Community Coproduction of Public Services: What Influences Citizens to Coproduce? (2014-10-28)
Bovaird, Tony; Loeffler, Elke; van Ryzin, Gregg G. and Parrado, Salvador
In: Lehrke, J.; Bohne, E.; Graham, J. and Raadshelders, J. eds. Public Administration and the Modern State: Assessing Trends and Impact (pp. 109-124)
ISBN : 978-1-137-43748-8 | Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan | Published : London

Public Management and Governance, Fourth Edition (2023-09-29)
Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke
Bovaird, Tony and Loeffler, Elke eds.
ISBN : 9781032253732 | Publisher : Routledge | Published : Abingdon, Oxon

The Palgrave Handbook of Co-Production of Public Services and Outcomes (2020-11-24)
Loeffler, Elke and Bovaird, Tony
Loeffler, Elke and Bovaird, Tony eds.
ISBN : 9783030537043 | Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan | Published : Cham, Switzerland