Danny S. L. Chow

Legitimating International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS): the case of Spain

Examinations of the growth in the adoption of International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) at a global level have focused on Anglo-Saxon countries. This paper considers the implications of IPSAS adoption in Spain. The authors found that a combination of factors, such as the political need to demonstrate improvements in public sector accountability, ‘code-law’ based systems of governance, European Union pressures for the harmonization of business accounting and the credibility resulting from major international institutions adopting IPSAS, all contributed to its legitimation in Spain.

New development: In pursuit of WGA—Research findings from the UK

In 1998, the UK Treasury and National Audit Office recommended the publication of whole of government accounts (WGA) and set out timelines for a full set of audited accounts to be made available for 2005–06. So far nothing has been published. This article considers the promises, practical pursuit and evaluation of WGA.

The reorganization of children's social services in England

Through a case study of a London boroughs childrens social services department (CSD), this article highlights themes concerning the reorganization of childrens social care provision. Reorganizations have been driven in part by tensions between the desire of social work professionals to maintain their autonomous modes of working, versus an increasingly managerialist outlook of more recent government initiatives. The acceptance and incorporation of managerialist ideals into working practices may be driven by a climate of greater risk aversion, leading to creeping risk management across CSDs.

When is personalisation considered a form of co-production? The case of Personal Budgets reform in English social care.

In recent times, co-production has become an all-embracing term applied in different contexts and with several meanings. Broadly speaking, co-production can be considered any “regular, long-term relationships between professionalized service providers and service users” (Bovaird in Public Adm Rev 67:847, 2007). Osborne and Strokosch (Br J Manag 24:S31–S47, 2013) differentiated co-production into three categories: operational, strategy and service. Although some of these categories may overlap, the focus of the present chapter is on the operational model of co-production.

Usefulness of consolidated government accounts : a comparative study.

ABSTRACT This comparative empirical study on consolidated government accounting reforms in the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Sweden reveals contextual differences affecting their adoption and usefulness. It can help policy-makers, public managers, and academics understand the gap between claims associated with the adoption of accounting technologies and their usefulness, as well as provide insights into dichotomies between their global proliferation and localized adaptations. IMPACT The belief in the usefulness of GAAP-based consolidated government accounts is not matched by a political will to make them more relevant. Although such systems are rhetorically appealing to reformers, once implemented, however, they struggle to compete against an institutional inertia of continued reliance on older accounting systems such as budgetary and statistical systems. The way forward requires asking how to best realign political incentives to focus on the longer-term benefits from using GAAP-based systems, such as improved clarity over long-term fiscal liabilities and transparency over the financing of hybrid entities that span both the public and private sectors.