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INTRODUCTION
Innovations in financial and accounting techniques are a fundamental component of the reforms undergone by public administrations over the last decades
under the umbrella term of New Public Management (NPM) (Hood, 1991 and
1995). After a period of enthusiastic adoption of managerial and market-based
principles and techniques by public-sector organisations in Western countries,
however, an international debate on their effectiveness has sprung up among
academics and practitioners (Olson et al., 1998, p. 18; and Lapsley, 1999). The
NPM literature has generally focused on the expected effects of reforms (see Lapsley
and Pallot, 2000, p. 215), but attempts at studying the consequences of such reforms
have often found unintended results and significant gaps between expected and
actual changes (Olson et al., 1998; and ter Bogt and van Helden, 2000).
A cornerstone of the reforms has been the adoption of accruals accounting. In
the literature, the introduction of accruals accounting in the public sector has
been controversial. Supporters have emphasised its ability to better meet user
needs and its consistency with the overall shift from ex-ante constraints to ex-post
accountability. Critics have raised both theoretical and practical objections.
In this regard, it is important to underline that accruals accounting is not
a clearly defined and unequivocal concept. Rather, it is itself an umbrella
term designating a wide range of solutions. In some countries and levels of
government, accruals accounting replaces traditional budgetary accounting,
while elsewhere the latter remains firmly in place. In between, a large variety
of approaches can be found, ranging from the adoption of accruals reporting in
conjunction with cash or commitment-based budgeting, to the use of accruals
data only for management-control purposes, to the introduction of some sort
of accrual-based management accounting for specific classes of inputs (e.g.,
supplies) within an otherwise traditional budgetary-accounting system.
The Italian flavour of accruals accounting for Local Governments (LGs)
would more precisely be labelled as accrual-based reporting, since the budget
The authors are respectively Professor, Universit`a Cattolica del Sacro Cuore; Assistant
Professor, Bocconi University and Lecturer, SDA Bocconi; and Associate Professor, Bocconi
University and Director, Public Management and Policy Department, SDA Bocconi, Italy.
Address for correspondence: Ileana Steccolini, Bocconi University, Via Bocconi 8, 20136
Milan, Italy.
e-mail: ileana.steccolini@sdabocconi.it
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Innovations in financial and accounting techniques are a fundamental component of these reforms, providing the technical lifeblood of NPM (Olson
et al., 1998, p. 18). Their common orientation has been towards the introduction
of accruals accounting, management control, and performance measurement,
with an increasing emphasis on external reporting (Hood, 1995 and Guthrie,
1998).
Initially, public-sector reforms were trustily welcomed by academics and
practitioners. Potential benefits were claimed for and promised. While the NPM
literature has generally focused on the expected effects of reforms (see Lapsley
and Pallot, 2000, p. 215), however, attempts at studying their actual consequences
show that reforms can run slowly, do not always produce the expected benefits,
and often originate undesired results. Gaps between intended and actual effects
of the reforms often emerge as the result of both (i) gaps between the formal
design of change and its actual development and (ii) gaps between the expected
and the actual uses of managerial tools (see for example, Olson et al., 1998; and
ter Bogt and van Helden, 2000).
A central feature of public-sector and, specifically, accounting reforms has
been the introduction of accruals accounting. Many countries worldwide have
been experimenting with accruals accounting for all or some tiers of government
(International Federation of Accountants - Public Sector Committee, 1997 and
OECD, 2002): among them New Zealand, Australia, the United Kingdom, Spain,
Sweden, Canada, France, Belgium, Ireland, and Finland. The European Union
and the United Nations have recently chosen to adopt IPSASs. Official discourse
on public-sector reforms praises the benefits deriving from accruals accounting.
In the international literature, the new basis of accounting is claimed to have
a number of advantages (Barrett, 1993; Evans, 1995; Mellor, 1996; Funnel
and Cooper, 1998 and International Federation of Accountants - Public Sector
Committee, 2002, pp. 710). Nevertheless, an increasing body of literature has
criticised the adoption of accruals accounting by public organisations on both
theoretical grounds (Oettle, 1990; Ma and Matthews, 1993; McRae and Aiken,
1994; Guthrie and Johnson, 1994; Carnegie and Wolnizer, 1995; Lewis, 1995;
Montesinos et al., 1995; Stanton and Stanton, 1998; Guthrie, 1998; Monsen
and Nasi, 1998, 1999 and 2000; Christiaens, 1999; Ellwood, 1999; and Monsen,
2002) and practical considerations (Guthrie, 1998; Stanton and Stanton, 1998;
Newberry, 2002; Carlin and Guthrie, 2003; and Hodges and Mellett, 2003).
In principle, an appealing compromise could be for budgetary and accruals
accounting to coexist, letting governments combine the benefits of both worlds.
Thus, some authors have contended that accruals and budgetary accounting
can be usefully integrated, as in the case of enterprise cameralistics (Monsen,
2002) or the Mega General Ledger (Christiaens and Vanhee, 2002), which
can facilitate the production of data for both accounting systems. At the same
time, however, such coexistence may cause confusion in managers, who receive
conflicting signals by the two sets of parallel accounting numbers (Guthrie, 1998)
and usually end up disregarding accruals data (Anthony, 2000).
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commitment basis (that is, in terms of establishments of amounts receivable and commitments) and the cash basis (that is, in terms of recoveries
and payments).
Financial reports similarly show actual revenues in terms of both estab-
their balance sheets and operating statements from their budgetaryaccounting statements through a complex system of year-end adjustments.
LGs can thus choose between a traditional and an integrated accounting
system. The former emphasises budgetary accounting and relies on yearend adjustments to produce a balance sheet and an operating statement.
The latter records transactions according to both budgetary and accruals
accounting rules and has consequently no need to translate cash and
commitment-based data into accruals at year-end.
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information (Emmanuel et al., 1990; and Haldma and Laats, 2002). In this
regard, the public sector carries out three main types of activities, which
require largely different competencies, task organisation, and routines (AnessiPessina, 2002; and Borgonovi, 2004): (a) regulation; (b) income redistribution;
and (c) direct provision of goods and services. Budgetary accounting is more
consistent with the first two types of activities, which can be viewed as inherently
governmental. The comparative benefits of accruals accounting, on the contrary,
emerge when governments engage in complex economic activities aimed at the
direct provision of goods and services, where cash inflows and outflows no longer
provide an acceptable approximation for revenues and expenses (Anessi-Pessina,
2002). In Italian LGs, where the accounting system may not be differentiated
across types of activities or organisational units, the incentives to adopt accruals
accounting can thus be expected to be comparatively weaker for governments
that focus on inherently governmental activities.
METHODS
To test the hypotheses, we conducted a survey of all LGs with populations above
40,000 (184 Municipalities and 103 Provinces as of January 1, 2004, for a total
of 287 LGs). The exclusion of smaller LGs has two main motivations. On the
one hand, large LGs have had a longer experience with the accounting reform,
since they were required to implement it in 1997 (for LGs with populations
above 100,000) or 1998 (for LGs with populations of at least 40,000). On the
other hand, small LGs are less likely to have the resources (human, financial
and organisational capital) to fully take advantage of the reforms, also because
their processes, activities, and volumes of transactions do not justify complex
interventions.
The survey was conducted through phone interviews to Chief Financial
Officers (CFOs). Phone interviews were preferred to personal interviews due
to the large number and wide geographical dispersion of the interviewees.
They were also preferred to mail surveys because the latter seldom achieve
adequate response rates: LGs CFOs are continuously asked to fill out forms and
questionnaires for official purposes and are thus reluctant to respond to academic
surveys. To reduce potential bias, the interviews were based on a structured
questionnaire designed by the researchers.
The questionnaire was divided into three sections that were respectively aimed
at: (i) discovering the current configuration of the LGs accounting system
(traditional vs. integrated); (ii) investigating the CFOs perceptions and beliefs
about the current accounting system, the system that would in principle be
most desirable, the strengths and weaknesses of accruals accounting; and (iii)
identifying who within the LGs had chosen the current configuration of the
accounting system, and why.
The final return rate was 82%, although some interviews failed to collect the
entire information set. Further data on LGs organisational and environmental
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features were drawn from a variety of public data bases, details of which are
provided below. Table 1 summarises the model for this study.
The hypotheses were tested using logistic regressions. The dependent variable
(CONFIG) was defined as a dummy for whether the LG adopted a traditional
or an integrated accounting system. The relevant information was drawn from
the survey.
To test hypothesis 1, size was considered as both an organisational factor
reflecting complexity and an environmental factor reflecting visibility. In
organisational terms, it was measured by the LGs number of employees
(EMPLOYEES) as reported in the survey. In environmental terms, it was defined
as the LGs population (POPULATION), as reported in the 2001 census of the
National Statistical Institute (ISTAT). The expected sign was positive for both
variables.
For hypothesis 2, Italy was divided into the four areas identified by ISTAT
(North-West, North-East, Centre and South), producing three dummy variables
(NE, CTR, STH). The expected sign was negative at least for variable STH.
For hypothesis 3, the amount of social capital was measured by a dummy
variable (UNI) for the presence of universities in the LGs territory. This is
an admittedly gross proxy, but the economic and social determinants that
are commonly discussed in the literature are not adequately measured in the
Italian context, at least at such a detailed level as individual municipalities and
provinces. The expected sign was positive.
For hypothesis 4, access to capital markets was measured by two dummy
variables: one (RATING) for whether the LG has been rated by at least one
major rating agency (Moodys, S&P, Fitch), as reported in the agencies websites;
the other (BONDS) for whether the LG has issued bonds, as reported by the
Department of the Interior. The expected sign was positive for both variables.
For hypothesis 5, CFOs perceptions were summarised by the answer to one
of the surveys questions, i.e., what accounting system they would prescribe if
they could affect legislation. More specifically, the dummy variable MYCONFIG
was set to one if the responding CFO supported the replacement of budgetary
accounting with accruals accounting. The expected sign was positive.
Hypothesis 6 was tested using the LGs 2004 per-capita cumulated surpluses
(CUMSURPLUS), as measured by traditional budgetary accounting (risultato di
amministrazione) and reported by the Department of the Interior. The variable
could not be signed a priori.
For hypothesis 7, the relative weight of non-inherently governmental activities
performed by each LG (e.g., water provision, waste disposal, pharmacies) was
measured by the percentage of personnel expenditures devoted to such activities
in 2003 (PCTNIG), as computed from the budgetary-accounting statements
collected by the Department of the Interior. The expected sign was again positive.
Finally, a control dummy (GOVTYPE) was introduced to distinguish between
the two types of LGs: provinces (0) and municipalities (1). Italian Provinces are
intermediate level local authorities whose main functions relate to regulation
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Geographical area
Social capital
Size
DEPENDENT VARIABLE:
Current configuration of
the accounting system
Variable
HP
Alexander (2007)
Norris and Moon (2005)
Putnam (2000)
Adams (2002)
Brudney and Selden (1995)
Burns and Waterhouse (1975)
Child and Mansfield (1972)
Damanpour (1996)
Khandwalla (1972)
References
Survey
National Statistical
Institute (ISTAT), 2001
Census
National Statistical
Institute (ISTAT), 2001
Census
Visibility: population
(POPULATION)
Dummies for four areas:
North-West (baseline);
North-East (NE); Center
(CTR); South (STH)
Survey
Survey
Source of Data
Complexity: Number of
employees (EMPLOYEES)
Measure
Table 1
Positive
Negative
for STH
Positive
Positive
Expected Sign
332
ANESSI-PESSINA, NASI AND STECCOLINI
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Slack resources
Types of activity
CONTROL VARIABLE:
Type of LG
Damanpour (1991)
Rosner (1968)
Damanpour (1996)
CFOs perceptions
Percentage of 2003
personnel expenditures
devoted to non-inherently
governmental activities
(PCTNIG)
Department of the
Interior
Department of the
Interior
Survey
Positive
Positive
Positive
Positive
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RESULTS
335
Table 2
Logistic Regression
Number of obs =
168
= 31.63
LR chi2 (12)
Prob > chi2
= 0.0016
= 0.1360
Pseudo R2
Logistic regression
Log likelihood = 100.44455
CONFIG
POPULATION
EMPLOYEES
NE
CTR
STH
UNI
RATING
BONDS
MYCONFIG
CUMSURPLUS
GOVTYPE
PCTNIG
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Odds Ratio
Std. Err.
0.9999985
1.0000250
1.0374000
0.6962431
0.4466466
1.1703910
1.6378140
0.6974704
1.8813320
0.9946894
0.2684728
2.1940530
0.0001585
0.5586603
0.3557033
0.2159976
0.4436631
0.8108050
0.2686693
0.4956335
0.0033779
0.1972072
3.8883910
P>z
[95% Conf.
Interval]
1.04e06
1.49
0.137
0.9999964
0.16
0.07
0.71
1.67
0.42
1.00
0.94
2.40
1.57
1.79
0.44
0.873
0.946
0.479
0.096
0.678
0.319
0.350
0.016
0.117
0.073
0.658
0.9997148
0.3610415
0.2557943
0.1731108
0.5567545
0.6206895
0.3278222
1.1225810
0.9880909
0.0636280
0.0680320
1.000336
2.980815
1.895094
1.152402
2.460357
4.321700
1.483929
3.152920
1.001332
1.132797
70.758930
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337
difficult to reconcile with the descriptive analysis (many CFOs cite human
and financial resource constraints as hindering accounting innovation). This
apparent inconsistency may have different explanations. One is that the proxy
for slack resources may be unsatisfactory. Another is that CFOs may be trying
to find ex-post, rational justifications for their behaviours, feeling that they will
be more acceptable than institutional ones.
CONCLUSIONS
338
specific features. For Italian LGs, the reliability and relevance of accruals
accounting statements is seemingly jeopardised by at least two major design
faults: the coexistence with traditional budgetary accounting, on the one hand;
and the only marginal and superficial adjustments from private-sector standards,
on the other.
If rational explanations for the adoption of accounting innovations do not
hold, the importance of institutional and cultural variables when introducing
public sector reforms is further confirmed. In our study, particularly important
was the role of CFOs, who seem to exert a fundamental influence on the design
of LGs accounting systems. When explaining their choices, responding CFOs
often underlined the need to comply with legal requirements. Interestingly, this
was particularly true for LGs that had maintained a traditional system, but only
slightly rarer among those that had chosen an integrated system. Thus, it is likely
that in some cases (where the traditional system was maintained), the reforms
were seen as a formal requirement and the traditional system as the simplest
way to comply with the new legislation without significantly affecting the LGs
culture and structure. In other cases, however, the law was seized as an excuse
to justify a more profound change and, for CFOs, to follow the prescriptions of
their professional networks.
In terms of policy implications, the most immediate is that CFOs and their
networks can significantly affect the successful implementation of accounting
reforms and must consequently be involved in policy formulation and reassured
about their potential role under the new system of accounting. CFOs must also
be encouraged to focus not only on the best technical design of the accounting
system, but also on its organisational impacts and its consistency with user needs
and accountability requirements. Another implication is that change cannot
be achieved by introducing innovative legislation only: other variables must be
taken into account, including the competencies, abilities, perceptions and overall
willingness to change of managers and politicians.
In terms of future research, several avenues can be mentioned. First, the
determinants of accounting innovation should be further investigated by looking
at other sets of variables, such as LG political orientation and stability on the one
hand, human factors (see, for instance, Nedovic et al., 1996) on the other. Second,
the relationship between accounting innovation and LG autonomy/accountability
could be fruitfully analysed using international comparisons. Third, it could
be interesting to investigate the relationship between the general attitude
towards organisational innovation and the specific attitude towards accounting
innovation. Fourth, the static and predominantly external perspective adopted in
this paper could be complemented by a dynamic, processual approach that also
pays due attention to internal variables: cases and longitudinal analyses which
study the evolutionary path of accounting changes over time and the unfolding
and interaction of internal and external variables could significantly enrich our
findings.
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NOTE
1 LGs are likely to have only partially succeeded in conducting the reform. Under the integratedsystem label, in other words, different approaches and speeds of implementation can be found.
However, the focus of this paper is not on the degree and direction of implementation, but
rather on the determinants of the choice of whether to adopt an integrated system of accrual.
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