The London Passenger Transport Board (LPTB) was a unique hybrid public body accountable only to a small number of stakeholders, yet it delivered substantial improvements in public services and provided good working conditions for its employees at the cost of its investors. London Transport: A...

This article argues that the historical stories of decline and revival in organisations are as important as the phenomenon itself. The complexity and humiliation of decline create strategic narratives which attempt to both clarify and justify events, but at the cost of over-simplification and...

Why do organisations decline, and what happens when they do? Strategy and Managed Decline: London Transport 1948-87 is a historical case study looking at how London Transport, a world beater in 1948, declined from being an international exemplar to dilapidation in 30 years. Strategy and Managed...

This book offers a novel explanation of the transformation of London’s transport from a free market to a public corporation rooted in social and political legitimacy rather than economic rationality. To become a single corporation London Transport first had to gain a ‘social licence’ to...