This publication presents the papers discussed at the Latin American Forum on Ensuring Transparency and Accountability in the Public Sector that took place on 5-6 December 2001. The Forum approved policy recommendations that reflect the shared experience of Member countries of the OECD and the OAS.

This publication presents the papers discussed at the Latin American Forum on Ensuring Transparency and Accountability in the Public Sector that took place on 5-6 December 2001. The Forum approved policy recommendations that reflect the shared experience of Member countries of the OECD and the OAS.

How we manage public services and hold them to account is critically important. Yet austerity, recent changes to accountability frameworks, and the loss of the Audit Commission have created a huge deficit in our understanding of how well services are delivered. The time is thus right to re-examine the state of our vital public services, as well as how we can make them more accountable. This book reopens the debate on what accountability means and provides unique insights into an increasingly complex organizational landscape. It presents a new and innovative way of evaluating public services that should be of use to academics and public servants alike. Synthesising empirical work across local government, health and social care, the police, and fire services, this book also explores the relationship between financial and performance accountability and makes the case for the need for a distinctive sense of public service accountability.

Includes the following papers: Fostering Dialogue to Strengthen Good Governance / Seiichi Kondo -- Preventing Corruption in the Americas / Cesar Gaviria (and more ... )

Transparency in government operations is widely regarded as an important precondition for macroeconomic fiscal sustainability, good governance, and overall fiscal rectitude. Notably, the Interim Committee, at its April and September 1996 meetings, stressed the need for greater fiscal transparency. Prompted by these concerns, this paper represents a first attempt to address many of the aspects of transparency in government operations. It provides an overview of major issues in fiscal transparency and examines the IMF's role in promoting transparency in government operations.

This paper describes the reforms introduced in the New Zealand public sector since the mid-1980s. The reforms included corporatization and privatization of most state-owned enterprises, the shift from a cash-basis to an accrual-basis accounting system and the compilation of a balance sheet for the central government and its entities, performance-based arrangements for the delivery of core government outputs; and institutional changes in expenditure control mechanisms. The paper also summarizes the impact of the reforms on government revenue and spending patterns, and discusses lessons learned from New Zealand’s experience.

The recent global financial and economic crisis has had surprising effects on several economies worldwide. This global event has promoted the discussion on how ethical, transparent, and rigorous the accountability of public sector institutions is. However, public manager accountability is translated into a vision that goes beyond its sphere of activity, demanding information on how public resources have been managed based on the maximization of social welfare and sustainable development. Tools, Strategies, and Practices for Modern and Accountable Public Sector Management is an essential reference source that discusses the process behind how public resources are managed as well as how they are coordinated to achieve collective success. Featuring research on topics such as corporate responsibility, fiscal accountability, and public administration, this book is ideally designed for researchers, managers, financial authorities, auditors, public managers, public administrators, regulatory authorities, accountants, professionals, and students involved with the accountability and reform of public management in local governments.

This publication sets out a framework for analysing the performance of governments in developing countries, looking at the government as a whole and at local and municipal levels, and focusing on individual sectors that form the core of essential government services, such as health, education, welfare, waste disposal, and infrastructure. It draws lessons from performance measurement systems in a range of industrial countries to identify good practice around the world in improving public sector governance, combating corruption and making services work for poor people.