For scholars who see policy initiatives in the area of human services as having the best chance to succeed when they bubble up from the bottom, there are other stories to tell based on the data presented in the book. Centralized policy reforms, even when given incentives to succeed, are no more likely to be implemented effectively than those that are imposed on criminal justice agencies. Interests and motivations are far more complex than what is presupposed by market tools. Rather than focusing first on a theory of policy tools, we need to know much more about what motivates people in political life, and how the organizational cultures of public agencies shape and are shaped by the complexity of peoples' motivations to engage in public service. Clearly, narrow self interest is at work in the public sector.
Civil servants do utilize their discretion to make work easier.
At the same time, civil servants are sometimes willing to put their careers on the line when they believe in integrity of their policy practices. As strict behaviorists, the authors avoid the task of investigating the normative beliefs and fundamental motivations of criminal justice civil servants. Rather, they argue that SPD and the introduction of market values into case processing was good in political terms because it shook up the routine of criminal justice budgetary politics in New York City. For one, I urge scholars to step back and investigate first what norms and values actually motivate public employees to distribute their time and consequently, social burdens and benefits the way they do. Market Justice, Political Justice.