The paper examines four different cases in which performance measurement has been applied within a process of policy reform. The cases will demonstrate that a large variety of mechanisms may underlie the use of performance measurement instruments, ranging from institutional imitation to...

This paper argues that the ‘New Public Management’ paradigm for public management theory and practice that has prevailed for the last thirty years is both flawed in theory and has failed in practice. We argue for an alternative to this paradigm that is rooted with the New Public Governance...