Can Performance Measurement Leads to Accountability? From Bureaucratic Silos/Caves to Democratic Governance Kaifeng Yang Associate Professor of Public Administration Florida State University Immediate Past Chair Center for Accountability and Performance American Society for Public Administration Public Performance & Management Review

Performance measurement and reporting leads to accountable government: An unfounded myth? Indifference at the middle/lower level Falsifying and cooking data What’s measured gets done Lack of use Political use, misuse, abuse ……

What’s the Problem? A implementation issue? A theory issue? A time lag issue? A culture issue? An issue of bureaucratic resistance? An issue of searching for right measures?

Are these the solutions? More discretion to managers? Political support? Building a performance culture? Building a goal orientation? More training? Citizen participation? Staff participation? Leadership commitment? …. Everything “good” should be in place?

Simple Assumptions Goals Indicators Data collection Interpretation Reporting Performance based accountability One Unitary Agent One Unitary Principal

The Political Reality Multiple principals Multiple agents Ambiguous boundaries Multiple tasks Dynamic relationships Information advantage not pre-set

Accountability process

Dialogue, Information Processing, and Public Sphere Managers and elected officials Managers and the public Managers and employees Managers and managers (coalitions) Elected officials and the public The public sphere: off- or on-line

Varieties of accountability Political accountability Hierarchical accountability Professional accountability Legal Moral

Promises: promiscuous

We expect too much from program- based PM? PM does not necessarily improve performance PM does not necessarily improve accountability PM is less important than many other factors PM can be a valuable ingredient for democratic governance, but the agency-based model is not enough

Silos to Systems SMART, SMARTER, but controllable? Agency-based or function-based PM, but jurisdiction-based or cross-function problems Governance and networks

Citizen participation Community visioning Citizen surveys Representation, willingness, capacity Citizen groups Nonprofits With or without government?