Performance audit, as practised by national audit offices, is a relatively recent and rapidly developing set of activities. Auditors claim to have moved beyond issues of compliance and regularity and to be able directly to investigate the efficiency and effectiveness of public programmes, projects, and institutions. These are developments with considerable implications for both democratic accountablility and managerial efficiency. Until now they have received little independent scrutiny, but in this book an international team of researchers analyses the growth of performance audit in five countries: France, Finland, The Netherlands, Sweden, and the UK. It is argued that audit offices face a series of strategic choices, and that in different countries they have thus far chosen somewhat different trajectories.
Performance audit is now in fashion, but has in the past been a somewhat closed world, little studied by outsiders. Now an international team of researchers has studied the work of five national audit offices -- France, Finland, The Netherlands, Sweden, and the UK. The picture thus revealed contains elements of technical innovation, methodological challenge, and crucial strategic choice.
