Organization and Reporting of Public Financial Accounts: Insights and Policy Implications from the Singapore Budget

This paper analyses the Singapore government budget's organization and reporting structure, and draws lessons and policy implications for improving public financial management practices. The paper finds that Singapore's fiscal marksmanship record has been poor with consistent underestimates of revenue and overestimates of expenditure. Second, subtle divergences from international reporting standards limit the information available and constrain the budget's analytical usefulness in international comparisons. Third, current reporting conventions of the budget fail to provide an adequate representation of the government's fiscal position. Fourth, revised estimates of budgetary balances in line with international reporting standards show a considerable increase in the fiscal space available. The policy implications of these findings are discussed, as well as some reporting changes which can help improve the fiscal marksmanship record, increase public sector transparency and accountability, and facilitate better quality discourse among all stakeholders on public financial management.     

Transparency and corruption: Measuring real transparency by a new index

Despite the salience of transparency in policy and democracy debates a global measurement of transparency has always been missing. In its absence, measuring the impact of transparency on accountability and corruption for a large number of countries has been difficult, with scholars using more or less adequate proxies. This paper introduces a new measurement of real transparency—the T-index—using 14 de facto components, based on direct observations of official websites in 129 countries and five de jure components, based on the transparency laws and conventions adopted. The resulting index is a measurement with very good internal and external validity and moderate precision. The paper argues that de facto transparency must be considered alongside de jure (legal) transparency if we are to judge the impact (or lack of) transparency against accountability and corruption, as a large implementation gap exists, in particular in poor countries, between legal commitments and real transparency. The T-index has significant impact on both perception and objective indicators of corruption, including perceived change in corruption over time as measured by the Global Corruption Barometer. An analysis of outliers shows that high transparency alone is not sufficient to achieve control of corruption, especially in countries with low human development and poor rule of law, although transparency is a robust predictor of corruption with GDP controls. The data with all sources is available for download as T-index 2022 dataset: DOI 10.5281/zenodo.7225627 and an interactive webpage developed for updates is available at www.corruptionrisk.org/transparency .     

Gauging the Impact of Transparency Policies

To what extent do transparency policies generate positive impacts? This seemingly rhetorical question has become the subject of increasing contention, partly because of two research‐based biases. First, researchers have been blinded by metrics and method. Using tools that are often ill suited to gauging the gradual, diffuse, and indirect effects of most transparency policies, research has found—unsurprisingly—spotty evidence of impact. Transparency studies would benefit from greater use of complementary approaches, such as careful tracing of impact processes and indicators, combined with sensible counterfactual reasoning. Second, researchers have been looking for impact with blinkered vision. In particular, a thematic fixation on accountability and participation has monopolized attention. Key preconditions—such as compliance with and implementation of transparency policies—remain relatively neglected, as do other areas of potential impact, including capacity building, how actors are leveraging previously restricted streams of information, and transparency's role in improving policy coordination and communication.     

Indignation or Resignation: The Implications of Transparency for Societal Accountability

International organizations, policy experts, and nongovernmental organizations promote greater governmental transparency as a crucial reform to enhance accountability and curb corruption. Transparency is predicted to deter corruption in part by expanding the possibilities for public or societal accountability, that is, for citizens and citizens associations to monitor, scrutinize, and act to hold public office holders to account. Although the societal accountability mechanism linking transparency and good government is often implied, it builds on a number of assumptions seldom examined empirically. This article unpacks the assumptions of principal‐agent theories of accountability and suggests that the logic of collective action can be used to understand why exposure of egregious and endemic corruption may instead demobilize the demos (i.e., resignation) rather than enhance accountability (i.e., indignation). We explore these theoretical contentions and examine how transparency affects three indicators of indignations versus resignation—institutional trust, political involvement, and political interest—given different levels of corruption. The empirical analyses confirm that an increase in transparency in highly corrupt countries tends to breed resignation rather than indignation.     

NSW Workers’ Compensation Reform: A Parody of Evidence‐based Policy Making

The characteristics and evolution of evidence‐based policy making in Australia and other mature democracies have been mapped extensively in this journal. This article advances research on the use of evidence in policy making, examining changes in the New South Wales workers’ compensation system from 2012 to 2014. This analysis of two phases of policy change, legislative implementation and statutory review, highlights the limitations of building integrated, coherent evidence‐based policy in a contentious policy area. The article finds that the collection of wide and detailed evidence will not satisfy requirements of evidence‐based policy without political will, transparency, and accountability.     

Transparency in multilateral climate politics: Furthering (or distracting from) accountability?

This article analyzes the interplay between transparency and accountability in multilateral climate politics. The 2015 Paris Agreement calls for a “pledge‐and‐review” approach to collective climate action with an “enhanced transparency framework” as a key pillar of the Agreement. By making visible who is doing what, transparency is widely assumed to be vital to holding countries to account and building trust. We explore whether transparency is generating such effects in this context, by developing and applying an analytical framework to examine the link between transparency and accountability. We find that the scope and practices of climate transparency reflect (rather than necessarily reduce) broader conflicts over who should be held to account to whom and about what, with regard to responsibility and burden sharing for ambitious climate action. We conclude that the relationship between transparency and accountability is less straightforward than assumed, and that the transformative promise of transparency needs to be reconsidered in this light.     

Transparency and accountability: principles and rules for the construction of publicity

Western countries have experienced a growing demand for accountability as a key element to the democratization of the State. This demand has given rise to an advocacy towards a transparency of State institutions and its subsequent public policies. This advocacy, in turn, aims to make governments accountable before the public. The goal of this article is to establish a critical perspective towards what we call transparency policy in favor of what we call publicity policy. The latter provides a normative argument for the concept of accountability aimed towards a deeper democracy and stronger public management processes. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Transparency in transnational governance: The determinants of information disclosure of voluntary sustainability programs

The rise of “new” transnational governance has intensified debates about a lack of accountability in global politics. Reviewing the mechanisms through which transparency can foster accountability beyond the state, this article explores the determinants of information disclosure in the field of transnational sustainability governance. Examining the institutional design of 113 voluntary sustainability programs, we find a positive correlation between the involvement of public actors and information disclosure. In contrast, the role of civil society is more ambiguous. There is no statistical support for arguments linking non‐governmental organization participation to increased transparency. At the same time, our analysis reveals a robust correlation between civil society‐led metagovernance and information disclosure. Moreover, we find that crowding has a negative effect on transparency, whereas normative peer pressures have no influence. At a broader level, the analysis reveals a lack of “deep transparency” among transnational sustainability governors. This limits the scope for transparency‐induced accountability in this policy domain.     

Citizens’ use of policy symbols and frames

This paper argues that citizens are capable of developing and promoting complex policy symbols, and that these symbols include supporting frames that explain and justify them. Based on a long-term study of education policies in Los Angeles, California, the paper uses interpretive methods to reconstruct and analyze these frames. Citizens developed two specific policy symbols while the district was engulfed in a desegregation debate; citizens identified schools as places where students gained academic knowledge and as institutions that affected broader race relations. However, education policy in Los Angeles could not support these two symbols over a long period of time, and a political movement to end mandatory busing eventually caused the academic symbol (originally the weaker of the two symbols) to become dominant. This trend reflects broader national discussions, in which education is now discussed in terms of standards and accountability and is evidence of continuing racism in US policy.     

Performance Standards and Evaluation

The benefits of performance monitoring for public services are identified as greater transparency of objectives and accountability for results. This article considers recent experience in developing standards to evaluate efficiency and effectiveness of public services. In broad terms this is being done through performance information which is a much more encompassing concept than standards or indicators. Such information is an element of an accountability framework that provides greater management autonomy and flexibility and extends to the private sector which is increasingly providing, or involved with the provision of, public services.     

Open Data for Science,Policy, and the Public Good

Supporters of open data believe that free and complete access to research data is beneficial for science, public policy, and society. In environmental science and policy, open data systems can enable relevant research and inform evidence‐based governmental decisions. This article examines the unlikely case of Brazil's National Institute for Space Research's transition toward an open data model. Considering Brazil's young democracy, incipient practice of government transparency and accountability, and lacking a tradition of science‐policy dialogue, this case is a striking example of how open data can support public debate by making information about forest cover widely available. The case shows the benefits and challenges of developing such open data systems, and highlights the various forms of accessibility involved in making data available to the public.     

Democratic Accountability in Decentralised Governance1

This article develops a conceptual framework for studying democratic accountability in decentralised governance, and discusses critical issues about democratic accountability from a citizen's perspective. First, the concept is discussed and adapted to make it useful for studying democratic accountability in different governance structures. Second, the article scrutinises conditions for democratic accountability in decentralised governance based on three models. Third, democratic accountability is discussed with reference to a case study of public reviewers operating in four municipalities in Sweden. The study indicates that municipal auditors and the local media have the greatest impact on municipal policy. On the whole, auditors improve local governments’ internal control and systems for steering and monitoring municipal policy, whereas the media sometimes alter the policy agenda without changing the policy. Auditors maintain and support an elitist democratic orientation of democratic accountability, and the media maintain this democratic orientation and in addition promote democratic dialogue. Viewed from a citizen's perspective, the traditional accountability system does not work satisfactorily. State inspectors and municipal auditors – two important public reviewers in the current system – could improve their work to make it more useful to citizens’ democratic control. Another way discussed to develop democratic accountability is to promote participatory policy and concrete means of accountability (e.g. on‐site visits, conducted tours and different forms of democratic dialogue). The formal way to improve democratic accountability implies more transparency, monitoring and control, which may also lead to distrust and scapegoat thinking (i.e. a surveillance society), whereas concrete modes of accountability, more associated with participatory and deliberative democracy, imply mutual responsibility and trust building. Strengthening participatory policy, active citizens, collective responsibility and democratic dialogue could be an alternative to the emerging audit society.     

Can Transparency Foster More Understanding and Compliant Citizens?

Voluntary policy compliance is an important yet rarely studied topic in public administration. To address the paucity of research, this article proposes and empirically tests a conceptual framework that ties policy transparency and policy understanding to voluntary policy compliance intentions. The reasoning is that the extent to which citizens understand a policy contributes to their intentions to comply with that policy. Further, the authors argue that policy transparency indirectly influences voluntary policy compliance intentions through a positive effect on citizens’ levels of policy understanding. To enhance the validity of the findings, the authors assess these relationships across two policy domains. The findings reflect an indirect positive effect of transparency on voluntary compliance occurring through policy understanding. However, this emerged only for one policy domain. These results suggest that the effects of policy transparency on policy understanding and voluntary policy compliance intentions may depend on the policy domain.     

Transparency, Democratic Accountability, and the Economic Consequences of Monetary Institutions

Debates about the appropriate mix between autonomy and accountability of bureaucrats are relevant to numerous areas of government action. I examine whether there is evidence of a tradeoff between transparency, democratic accountability, and the gains from monetary delegation. I begin by presenting a simple theoretical model which suggests that central banks that are transparent, in the sense of publishing their macroeconomic forecasts, will find it easier to acquire a reputation. Despite making central banks more subject to outside scrutiny then, monetary transparency can lead to improved economic outcomes. I also consider arguments about the effect of accountability provisions involving parliamentary oversight and control over central bankers. The article then uses a new data set to examine these issues empirically, focusing on a natural experiment involving disinflation costs under different central banking institutions during the 1990s. Results suggest that countries with more transparent central banks face lower costs of disinflation while accountability provisions have no clear effect on disinflation costs. My results also concord with earlier findings that the effect of monetary institutions is conditional on other features of the political environment.     

Electoral accountability,clarity of responsibility and labor market policy

Does the exercise of accountability in elections have palpable policy effects? Building on recent advances in the economic voting literature, we show that electoral accountability leaves an imprint on labor market policy when left-wing governments are in office. When responsibility for the economy is clear and elections offer an opportunity to claim credit for economic expansion, labor protections and benefits become more generous. However, when clarity of responsibility is low and incumbents can expect to veer electoral responsibility, left-wing governments are more likely to retrench labor market policy. These results hold for policies benefiting both labor market insiders and outsiders. Consistent with evidence that the labor market is the purview of the left, electoral accountability does not condition labor market policy under right-wing governments. We discuss the implications of these results in the context of growing party system fragmentation and weaker accountability across advanced industrial democracies.     

Developing and Testing a Theoretical Framework for Computer‐Mediated Transparency of Local Governments

This article contributes to the emerging literature on transparency by developing and empirically testing a theoretical framework that explains the determinants of local government Web site transparency. It aims to answer the following central question: What institutional factors determine the different dimensions of government transparency? The framework distinguishes three dimensions of transparency—decision making transparency, policy information transparency, and policy outcome transparency—and hypothesizes three explanations for each: organizational capacity, political influence, and group influence on government. Results indicate that each dimension of transparency is associated with different factors. Decision‐making transparency is associated with political influence; when left‐wing parties are strong in the local council, local government tends to be more transparent. Policy information transparency is associated with media attention and external group pressure, and policy outcome transparency is associated with both external group pressure and the organizational capacity. The authors discuss the implications for policy and administration.     

Real Reform or Change for Chumps: Earmark Policy Developments, 2006–2010

In response to widespread perceptions of problems associated with congressional earmarks, reform efforts began in late 2006 and continued through 2010. This essay summarizes those problems, explains the distribution of earmarks within Congress, and documents their rise and relative fall between 1991 and 2010 using government and public interest group databases. The author explains and critiques earmark reform policies, including congressional rules, initiatives taken by the congressional appropriations committees, and reforms pursued by the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations. Congressional rules and committee‐initiated reforms have been most effective, resulting in significant improvements in earmark transparency and accountability. The number and dollar value of earmarks first dropped noticeably in fiscal year 2007 after an earmark moratorium, and then stabilized as reforms were implemented. It is premature to conclude that these levels will continue or that reforms will alter the policy content of earmarks or their distribution among members of Congress.     

Accountability‐by‐Proxy in Transnational Non‐State Governance

Transnational non‐state governance arrangements (NGAs) are increasingly common in areas such as labor standards and environmental sustainability, often presenting themselves as innovative means through which the lives of marginalized communities in developing countries can be improved. Yet in some cases, the policy interventions adopted by the managers of these NGAs appear not to be welcomed by their supposed beneficiaries. This article accounts for this predicament by examining the effects of different configurations of accountability within NGAs promoting labor rights. Most labor‐rights NGAs incorporate “proxy accountability” arrangements, in which consumers and activists hold decision makers accountable “on behalf” of the putative beneficiaries of the NGAs: workers and affected communities in poorer countries. The article shows how and why different combinations of proxy versus beneficiary accountability influence the choice of policy instruments used by NGAs, and applies the argument to three prominent non‐state initiatives in the domain of labor standards.     

Policy Area as a Potential Moderator of Transparency Effects: An Experiment

Building on the counterintuitive findings of recent empirical studies that transparency in political decision making may have a negative effect on public legitimacy beliefs, this article suggests that transparency has different effects depending on the policy area. Specifically, it argues that transparency is less effective in policy decisions that involve trade‐offs related to questions of human life and death or well‐being. Using an experiment that involved 1,032 participants, the effect of transparency is tested in two policy areas that represent routine priority setting (culture and leisure) and policy decisions implicitly related to human life and well‐being (traffic security). Results indicate that transparency can increase public acceptance of political decisions, but this effect is moderated by the type of policy area. Furthermore, a limited type of transparency in which decision makers provide justifications for their decisions can result in benefits while avoiding potential costs.     

Strengthening family planning stewardship with a total market approach: Mali,Uganda, and Kenya experiences

To improve overall market sustainability, governments and their donors are ramping up efforts to strengthen stewardship in developing country health markets. Key stewardship functions include generating intelligence that enable policymakers, ministerial leaders, and program managers to develop evidence‐based policies and strategies to improve the resource management, supply, and use of health products and services. The total market approach (TMA), an analytic and policy framework, generates market intelligence and improves evidence‐based decision‐making, and also strengthens other stewardship functions, such as building and sustaining partnerships, strengthening tools for implementation, aligning government policy with market interventions, and ensuring accountability/transparency. TMA evolved in response to the phase out of donor support for reproductive health (RH) and family planning (FP) programs and the need to improve coordination among public, private, nongovernmental organizations, and civil society to achieve greater equity, health impact, and market sustainability. To assess TMA's role in strengthening the stewardship of RH/FP markets, this article reviews three countries that applied TMA principles: Mali, Uganda, and Kenya. It identifies how TMA processes influenced stewardship functions and assesses to what degree these processes have contributed to concrete actions to improve market efficiency and sustainability.