Governance systems, much like humans, can sustain capacity stress over long periods of time. Whereas public policy or public management informed analysis often tends to focus on the extremes of success or failure, the more complex reality is that these systems usually neither completely excel nor completely fail in what they do, but combine both in the way they cope and perform. This book explores one archetypal case – overcrowding in the England and Wales prison system. Packed with data, it provides an original analysis of the system through an era of managerialist change. This book contributes to cutting-edge debates in the management of prisons in particular, but the wider field of public management and executive politics more generally. It introduces the new and original concept of 'chronic capacity stress' (CCS), one which will be valuable to anyone – academics, practitioners, students alike - interested in how policy systems succeed and fail in complex and ever-changing political, economic, and social environments.
