Power, performance, and the governance of systemic goals: evidence from national wellbeing framework integration

Performance regimes are critical tools within contemporary governance but face well-documented limitations when goals are complex and power dispersed. We explore how performance regimes might utilize what Joseph Nye called soft power: the ability to attract others and shape their preferences. We develop the Performance Strategy Framework (PSF) which shows how performance regimes can operate through soft power, using attraction and agenda setting, hard power, using financial inducement and coercion, or smart power, combining mechanisms from both. We employ the PSF in a most similar systems comparative analysis of national ‘wellbeing framework’ integration in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, drawing on 35 interviews and a substantial document review. Our findings locate a critical role for soft power mechanisms, particularly set within a smart power strategy, in achieving effective integration. We provide a novel theoretical framework to modernize performance management theory and actionable guidance to design ‘smarter’ performance regimes.