The impact of State Audit Institutions - a comparison of the Norwegian and German welfare sectors

We have seen a change in the State Audit Institutions role the past three decades. Public management reforms have introduced new steering and accountability relationships in most European countries. Decentralization and extended use of market mechanisms h ave become standard, and various types of performance measurement and management schemes have been introduced creating a new role for the traditional accountability forums such as the State Audit Institutions. Most of the State Audit Institutions have sta rted using new audit methodology to keep up with these changes. One of the methods is performance audit. These are evaluative methods to take account also of the output and outcome of the resources spent, and not just compliance with the law, rules and st andards that auditors traditionally have concentrated on. The evaluative methods have been used for 20-30 years now, varying between the different countries and State Audit Institutions. State Audit Institutions invest a lot of resources in evaluation ac tivities. These also demand a lot of time and resources of the audited entities. It is therefore important to find out if the activity contributes to improvement and efficient use of resources in the audited entities. It is also important to investigate w hat the indented and unintended consequences of holding public administration to account might be. The primary goal of my research stay in Potsdam will be a comparative study on the audit of the welfare sectors in Germany and Norway based on case studie s and a document analysis of the reports. Another goal of the research stay will be to develop methods for data collection so that Germany can join an ongoing comparative research project on the impact of performance audit.