Cameron's Big Society speech: a day for mutual learning?

The Big Society has always been synonymous with David Cameron. He sees the Big Society as his raison d'etre for being Prime Minister and, as we argued in One Year On, he is alone in the cabinet in being comfortable talking about it. Today's speech reaffirms his commitment and emphasises that it is still very much a Cameroonian project. Nevertheless, despite prime ministerial backing the Big Society is on shaky ground. The idea still generates huge amounts of scepticism and cynicism. This month a ComRes poll revealed that only 30 per cent of people understood what the term Big Society actually meant, compared with 40 per cent in February. Evidently, there is still work to be done. A cabinet project? In particular, the Big Society is yet to be embedded as a cross-Whitehall agenda. The new policy announcements we learned today included removing paper work for gift aid donations up to £5,000 and rewarding social-action neighbourhood groups with additional money. These are all new policies that are being implemented by Number 10 and the Cabinet Office. The fact that new policies were announced is testimony to how far a project can get on the back of prime ministerial conviction. With seemingly little institutional support, the Prime Minister has managed to make the Big Society still appear relevant and important. Yet it is still not clear that the rest of Whitehall supports the Big Society. The 'big ticket' reforms were present in the speech – welfare reform, NHS reform, Free Schools. But these were policies developed in opposition before the launch of the Big Society brand. One cannot help feel these policies will survive or fail without the Big Society. This may be a concern. One advantage of the Big Society is that has the potential to serve as the Coalition's overarching philosophy. It has the potential to develop cabinet consensus, join-up policies, and strengthen the coherence of government reforms.  In the enduring absence of the Public Service Reform white paper, which itself is supposed to bring public service reforms together, many will be disappointed that the speech did not signal more Whitehall unity. Building support But the Prime Minister still has levers he can pull to embed support for the Big Society across Whitehall. Performance management frameworks were used by the previous government to keep government departments accountable to the Prime Minister. Although performance management has been largely rejected by the Coalition, the Business and Structural Reform Plans do indicate there may be mileage yet in management systems. The Prime Minister can also boost the institutions within his immediate vicinity. The recent strengthening of the Policy and Implementation Unit illustrates this is a viable route for further cementing the Big Society. But the most effective and enduring way of ensuring cross-Whitehall support would be to build cabinet consensus behind the Big Society. One option is to boost the Big Society enthusiasts around the Cabinet, either proactively or by outlasting other members of the cabinet. These are all levers Prime Ministers have historically pulled to embed their personal agenda. No doubt the Prime Minister will add his own innovations to the mix. For those of us keen to learn how the most valuable political commodities - prime ministerial power and support - can be institutionalised, we should continue to pay close attention to the Big Society.