New development: Rethinking public sector accounting systems by rediscovering their relational nature

Carmela Barbera, Mariafrancesca Sicilia and Ileana Steccolini

Public Money & Management, 2024, vol. 44, issue 8, 727-732

Abstract: Accounting systems have been traditionally seen as technical calculative practices to quantify public sector activities, used by governments for (internal) decision-making purposes and to be externally accountable. This article suggests taking a different perspective by considering the relational nature of accounting systems, with the idea that a more interactive approach between citizens and governments can enhance both decision-making and accountability. By relying on a more dialogic approach, policy-makers and public managers at all levels of government can encourage citizens to participate in public service performance measurement, so that citizens can comment on what counts, how to measure it, and how to account for it. Doing this will reinvigorate government legitimacy, increase mutual trust between citizens and the public sector, and pursue public values that citizens actually want.

Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/09540962.2024.2370550 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:pubmmg:v:44:y:2024:i:8:p:727-732

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/RPMM20

DOI: 10.1080/09540962.2024.2370550

Access Statistics for this article

Public Money & Management is currently edited by Michaela Lavender

More articles in Public Money & Management from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().