Purpose: To assess the potential of a paper diary for strengthening accountability in public agricultural extension services. Therefore a paper diary called 'Diary for Agricultural Extension Officers' was developed and tested in Uganda. Design/methodology/approach: A qualitative case study research approach was applied for the development and…

The purpose of this work is to provide empirical evidence as to how state level Freedom of Information or Access to Information and data protection regulator bodies in Mexico carry out their training tasks. We use different theoretical assumptions, particularly those that refer to the idea of "training in the public sector" regarding two…

As the privatisation of the public sector has grown rapidly in Sweden in the last decade, private companies have become an imperative part of education. Private companies sell and deliver consultancy, hardware, software, services, etc. to schools and municipalities. This study examines a growing rate of activities from companies and businesses…

In Africa, the processes of democratic consolidation are endangered in spite of various administrative and financial reforms having been implemented to reinforce fiscal consolidation and strengthen governance in the public sector. This then requires investigating the efficacy of these ingenuities in situations where the policy-makers wield…

New public management (NPM) has dominated the reforms in the higher education sector and the academic discussion on how universities should be governed since the 1980s. Besides, the introduction of accountability and efficiency measures in the form of performance measurement and pay-for-performance scheme, a key debated aspect of NPM is the…

Research and Development (R&D) project managers in Higher Education must deal with uncertainty, ambiguity, competition, accountability and different objectives for professors, scientists, firms, users and other stakeholders. Formal project management frameworks are commonly adapted to support this. However, the wide range of challenges related…

This paper draws on recent research in Europe and England to discuss the politics of accountability. It is suggested that, as policies in education are increasingly focused on delivering technical-managerial accountability, that is accountability understood as evidenced in international, national, institutional and individual comparative measures…

This document provides a brief description of the context for, and use of, the European Training Foundation (ETF) Financing Prism, and includes a call for evidence regarding the development and implementation of vocational education and training (VET) financing policies, as well as the use of the prism itself. The components of the prism are…

Establishing high standards for educational accountability and informing those not already familiar with the basic components of a strong accountability system is a fresh avenue in EFL context, particularly in Iran, where the perceived shortcomings of English learning in the public sector are evident. The present mixed methods study used…

The general problem observed is that even though PPhPs [public-philanthropic partnerships] are a way of relieving the fiscal burden of higher education, a lack of formal policies, standards or guidelines governing the inter-organizational relationship between philanthropic foundations and public educational institutions has led to governance…

Since devolution in the late 1990s, education policy in England has diverged further from that in Scotland and also from policy in Wales and Northern Ireland. In this paper we review the roots and trajectory of the English education reforms over the past two decades. Our focus is the schools sector, though we also touch on adjoining reforms to…

In the original paper, it was argued that while there is an array of methods and methodologies available, their use is delimited by the culture of accountability that prevails in public sector institutions, a fact that is particularly problematic given the complexity and diversity of evaluation contexts today. This short rejoinder, to responses…

Evaluation occurs within a specific context and is influenced by the economic, political, historical, and social forces that shape that context. The culture of evaluation is thus very much embedded in the culture of accountability that currently prevails in public sector institutions, policies, and program. As such, our understanding of the…

The purpose of this article is to provide an assessment and analysis of public sector performance contracting as a performance management tool in Kenya. It aims to demonstrate that performance contracting remains a viable and important tool for improving public sector performance as a key element of the on-going public sector transformation…

In this article, we examine the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) as an example of a unique node within larger policy networks composed of new policy entrepreneurs (e.g., venture philanthropists, think tanks, private "edubusinesses" and their lobbyists, advocacy organizations, and social entrepreneurs). These new policy…