What does it mean for public financial managers to be professionally and democratically accountable in managing public debt? How do they accomplish (or fall short of) accountability? What are the results of their accountability (or lack thereof)? This paper develops an analytic framework for...

The movement toward open government and fiscal transparency is a worldwide effort that promises the possibility of better and stronger democracy. Transparency is also presumed to help combat corruption and waste. Greater transparency in government thus has been an important goal of many...

In this chapter, we argue that organizational evil (OE) is, at the same time, a fundamentally nonsensical idea and a concern of real importance for those studying or leading organizations. Nonsensical, we believe, because the senses in which the expression “organizational evil” is typically...

Everybody – or at least every policy analyst – knows that the logic of collective action is such that individuals' self-interested rationality inevitably leads to collective irrationality: Dominant individual strategies in collective-action settings lead typically self-interested individuals...

Changing the nature of governance arrangements comprises one element in the public service reform programme. New governance forms include arm's-length agencies, multi-organisational partnerships, hybrids and company structures. In theory, changed governance arrangements offer benefits in terms...

Improvement boards offer a new approach to supporting stronger performance by public service organizations, and especially those facing significant issues of change. They involve formalized peer challenge and support by senior politicians and managers from other agencies. The authors document...

This article provides early results from a long-term evaluation of the turnaround strategies by poorly-performing local authorities in England. The history and theory behind central government interventions into local government is reviewed, focusing on the Comprehensive Performance Assessment...

The transfer of responsibilities from central to local government has often been justified on the grounds of efficiency and democracy under the principle of subsidiarity. The existing models for mapping local government power in Europe, however, are often insufficiently detailed to allow...