England crash out of the World Cup and the recriminations begin. The public and the media will now embark on a process of personalising blame and apportioning it to the highest possible target. It's a familiar process, one that mirrors every scandal to hit the public sector, where the press automatically bay for the blood of the most prominent executive. But does this culture of blame actually help to solve problems? Or, does it prevent us from a full evaluation of what went wrong by fixating on one individual or action?
Fabio Capello is about as good as it gets as a football manager. Perhaps England fans need to be reminded why. During his first stint of management at AC Milan in the early 90s he won four Seria A titles in five years with a team nicknamed “The Invincibles” who went unbeaten for 58 league games between 19 May 1991 and 21 March 1993. During two spells at Real Madrid, Capello guided the club to the Spanish league title in his first and only season in charge and managed the same feat during his second tenure, despite taking charge of a team that was suffering one of the longest spells in its history without a trophy. Capello was well-known as a disciplinarian, unafraid of taking on even his superstar players. This technique worked at Real Madrid, and it worked at AC Milan with the likes of world-class players like Marco van Basten, Ruud Gullit, and Paolo Maldini.
Even after England's performance at the World Cup, can Capello's credentials really be questioned? The Independent splashed yesterday with ‘Don't blame [Capello], blame the players”, while
Roy Keane in the Guardian says that to ‘keep criticising and questioning the manager is crazy... The goals they conceded against Germany, particularly the first couple, had nothing to do with Capello's choice of system or tactics... It was just very bad defending." However,
Richard Williams, sports writer at the Guardian, claims that Capello's mistakes included the ‘boot camp' conditions where players were not permitted to have any fun, and the fact that he clamped down on John Terry's whinging. Which raises the question, if his management style was perfect for AC Milan, Real Madrid and Juventus, why is it not right for the England team?
A brief look at Capello's predecessors show a similar pattern of focusing the blame on managers to the point of excluding any scrutiny of the players. Sven-Goran Eriksson had a good record in European domestic football before becoming England manager. But apparently England's poor performances were down to Eriksson's ‘ice cool' appearance on the touchline, with one player, Gareth Southgate, moaning that “we needed Winston Churchill but we got Iain Duncan Smith.” No mention of the leadership capabilities of the captain on the pitch though. Steve McClaren, who achieved success with Middlesbrough before becoming England manager, continued his success after leaving the post, taking Dutch side FC Twente to their first ever Dutch Championship win, albeit while developing a
comical accent in the process.
To return to Capello, let's remember that England won 9 of their 10 matches in the qualifying campaign. The players simply failed to perform in South Africa, much like they have failed to perform at any crucial stage on the international scene. However, the full blame will continue to be laid squarely at the door of the manager because of the UK's pervasive culture – reflected and magnified by the press – of selecting a single, senior target to personify systemic failures.
In the public sector, this culture has resulted in highly centralised and risk-averse structures, where decision-making and responsibility is hoarded by those higher up the organisation because those at the top are rightfully concerned that they will be the ones who will be held accountable when things go wrong. When politicians talk about localism or ‘empowering the frontline,' they should be wary that this is not a silver bullet to solving public sector inefficiency. Big questions need to be answered such as: Who will be held responsible when things go wrong? Where will blame lie for underperformance? If frontline staff are held responsible and blamed for their failures, will this not make them overly risk averse and thereby restrict their ability to simply do their job – the raison d'être for ‘freeing' them up from overbearing targets and stifling management in the first place? For true localism and public sector empowerment to work, there will need to be an accompanying cultural shift in the way in which the press, the public and government, apportion blame. Tackling the public sector is hard enough. Tackling the blame culture will be even more difficult than managing the England football team to World Cup glory.