Consulting University: A Reflection from Inside

This paper contributes to a growing literature on the role of management consultants in the public sector by examining a sensitive area of management consulting, as exercised by university faculty members and as applied to universities. It frames the development of management consulting as an idea that originated in universities, travelled first into the private sector and then into the public sector, from country to country, and was eventually applied to universities – with problematic effects.     

The Evolution of Client‐Consultant Relationships: A Situational Analysis of IT Consultancy in the Public Sector

This research proposes a situational understanding of the role of con‐sultants. The analysis is grounded on a case from Italian local government over a ten year period. The case is one of the earliest adopters of an ERP system in the public sector. The paper extends current understanding of client‐consultant relationships by developing a specific picture of changes in the role of consultants over time. In the case analysed, multiple changes in client‐consultant relationships occurred. They were due to particular historical contingencies in the evolution of the structure of expertise in the field. The case contributes to knowledge on consultants by contrasting bilateral and instantaneous accounts of client‐consultant relationship with a perspective that overcomes the distinction between context and individual action.     

NOT REPORTING A PROFIT: CONSTRUCTING A NON‐PROFIT ORGANISATION

Public sector reformers advocate contracting‐out as a means of improving cost‐effectiveness. In the health sector, market‐based contracts with for‐profit organisations can reduce equity of access and divert public funds to private gain. Such issues have prompted policy makers to seek alternative contracting strategies. This paper examines a primary health care policy whereby government contracts with private non‐profit organisations to increase efficiency and meet World Health Organisation ideals. The study found that the policy's implementation has not achieved these aims when for‐profit providers masquerade as non‐profit organisations. The implication is that governments may find it more effective to manage for structural diversity than mandate homogenisation.     

The Seven Deadly Sins of Performance Auditing: Implications for Monitoring Public Audit Institutions

Performance auditing is a longstanding feature of democratic government in many countries. It aims to lift the efficiency and effectiveness of public sector organisations, but numerous authors have voiced scepticism about its ability to do so. From three decades of performance auditing literature, this paper distils seven critiques of performance auditing: ‘anti‐innovation’, ‘nit‐picking’, ‘expectations gap’, ‘lapdog’, ‘headline hunting’, ‘unnecessary systems’ and ‘hollow ritual’. The paper concludes that the critiques are not valid in all cases, but serve to categorise risks to be managed in the design of performance audit programs and associated institutional arrangements. In light of the critiques, the paper proposes desirable elements of frameworks for monitoring and reporting the performance of institutions with performance audit mandates.     

Directed matching with endogenous Markov probability: clients or competitors?

This article analyzes the practice of opportunistic poaching of consultants by clients, with particular reference to the business consulting industry. The strategic interaction of consulting groups, client firms, and consultants gives rise to a market equilibrium in a mixed economy. Under very general conditions, whenever a match client‐consultant is formed, a pure strategy equilibrium exists where the consulting group pleases the client's request and the consultant is poached by the client. Thus, the equilibrium quality of the consulting services market does not depend only on the consulting group's assignment strategy but also on the clients' poaching behavior (consumption externality).     

Decomposing financial (in)stability in emerging economies

The analysis of the build-up of risks in emerging economies have traditionally been scarce and focused mostly on external risks, despite the recent substantial development of their financial system. This paper builds an index of financial vulnerabilities tailored to emerging economies, grouping 32 indicators around four poles: valuation and risk appetite, imbalances in the non-financial sector, financial sector vulnerabilities, and global vulnerabilities. It adopts a model-free approach, purposely departing from early warning models or complex econometric constructs, and rely on data made already available by international organisations. Our index of financial vulnerabilities enables a granular mapping of where risk originates and how it spreads to other parts of the financial system. Using various data visualisation tools and benefitting from the flexibility of our index’s methodology, we are able build a narrative of the evolution of financial stability in emerging economies from 2005 to 2015. Finally, we also discuss the relation between our index and both the business cycle (proxied by GDP) and the credit cycle (proxied by the credit-to-GDP gap).     

New Public Management: The Cruellest Invention of the Human Spirit?1

This article examines one of the most significant phenomena of the late twentieth and early twenty‐first centuries—the emergence of New Public Management (NPM). NPM has been widely adopted, internationally. However, its adoption is based on governments having faith in its deployment to transform their public sectors using private sector performance criteria. In this article, the case is advanced that the widespread use of NPM is often a cruel disappointment for governments. This is demonstrated by focusing on four key elements of NPM, as practised in the early twenty‐first century—the role of management consultants, the development of e‐government, the emergence of the ‘audit society’ and the increasing importance of risk management.     

Book Reviews

References to ‘customers’ have become commonplace in the policy discourses within UK government and other public sector bodies. It is a working assumption of UK public sector management that the concept of the ‘customer’ can be applied to any public sector service agency or department; and this paper analyses how the UK government's revenue department, formerly titled the Inland Revenue (IR), re-characterised firstly taxpayers and latterly tax claimants as ‘customers’, rather than ‘users’, of IR services. This paper identifies some problems, dilemmas and ambiguities associated with this reconceptualisation in the context of an organisation that is predominantly a regulating department. Far from being merely a reclassification of the taxpayer as customer, the emerging discourse and associated practices of the IR were in part embedded in organisational change, including the merger with HM Customs and Excise to form the present-day HMRC. Thus this case analysis illustrates the limits of consumerism as a strategic tool of a government revenue department and raises wider questions for public management.     

Joined‐Up Government and the Challenges to Accounting and Accountability Researchers

Abstract: Collaborative working between public sector bodies in the UK, sometimes involving partnerships with private sector and not‐for‐profit organisations, was promoted heavily by the Labour Government (1997–2010) under what is sometimes labelled ‘Joined‐Up Government’. The Conservative – Liberal Democrat Coalition Government, elected in 2010, appears likely to continue to promote such policies. The objective of this paper is to raise awareness of what may be seen as an important and developing agenda in public services in which accounting and accountability researchers are barely visible. The paper reviews the meanings and motivations of joined‐up government and its development in the UK. A number of challenges are presented, including the need to refocus research from an entity to a network perspective; to assess whether joined‐up government delivers value‐for‐money services; to join the debate on the development of related accounting techniques; to seek precision in specifying accountability mechanisms and to adapt our research methods.