The normativity of numbers in practice: technologies of counting, accounting and auditing in Malawi's civil service reform

Anders, Gerhard

doi:10.1111/1469-8676.12101

Cited by 10 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…(Gong, 2009a(Gong, , 2009bMathur, 2012;Smart, 2018;Wilcock, 2019). Cases of the latter are health-care providers in the USA (Koreff et al, 2021), the Brazilian Regional Courts of Accounts (Lino et al, 2021), the City of Montréal (Courtois and Gendron, 2017), local government in Australia (Pilcher, 2014), higher education (Shore, 2018), police services (Chan, 1999) or civil servants' policies (Anders, 2015).…”

Section: Preliminary Analysis Of Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The intersection between ‘The Audit Society’ and public sector corruption and fraud: – a literature review and future research agenda

D’Andreamatteo

Grossi

Mattei

et al. 2022

QRAM

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Purpose This paper aims to explore how the phenomena of corruption and fraud in the public sector have been portrayed in the literature using the Audit Society Framework (Power, 1997). Design/methodology/approach The authors conducted a structured literature review (Massaro et al., 2016) to unveil relevant literature in the area of corruption and fraud in the public sector. Findings Results highlight that the literature using “The Audit Society” theory is still scant. Notwithstanding the call for a more decisive role of auditors in fighting corruption and fraud, much is still to be discovered about consequences of auditing and what “good quality” is. Research limitations/implications The main limitation is that only literature in English has been included. Practical implications This paper helps practitioners and policymakers to take and implement informed decisions with regards to the fight against fraud and corruption. Social implications In calling for more research in the domain of audit, fraud and corruption in the public sector, this paper promotes a higher focus of society on public interest and the common good. Originality/value This paper investigates one part of The Audit Society related to corruption and fraud, topics that are still very underdeveloped and unexplored by researchers. From the findings the authors suggest possible new avenues for further research.

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Section: Preliminary Analysis Of Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The intersection between ‘The Audit Society’ and public sector corruption and fraud: – a literature review and future research agenda

D’Andreamatteo

Grossi

Mattei

et al. 2022

QRAM

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…The integrity of digital systems is further eroded by regular security breaches; and the centralisation of biometric or identity data in national repositories increases the reward for external hackers, whilst creating almost 'infinite' opportunities for internal official misuse of personal data (Breckenridge, 2005, p.281). Whilst digital fraud in public systems is also prevalent in most other countries (Anders, 2015;Busch & Henriksen, 2018), African states tend to lack the skills needed to effectively counter these threats (Barata & Cain, 2001).…”

Section: Working Practicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Digital discretion and public administration in Africa: Implications for the use of artificial intelligence

Plantinga¹

2022

Preprint

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The digitalisation of public services is implicated in fundamental changes to how civil servants make decisions and exercise discretion. Most significant has been a shift in responsibility away from ‘street-level bureaucrats’ to ‘system-level bureaucrats’; a technology-savvy community of officials, consultants and private enterprises involved in the design of information technology systems and associated rules. The relatively recent inclusion of artificial intelligence (AI) and data-driven algorithms raises new questions about the conflation of policy formulation and system development activities, but also intensifies concerns about the epistemic dependence and policy alienation of public officials. African public administrations are in an especially vulnerable position with respect to the adoption of AI, and so this chapter seeks to synthesise lessons from previous digital implementations on the continent, and considers the implications for AI use. Four broad considerations emerge from the review of literature: Integrity of recommendations provided by decision-support systems, including how they are influenced by local organisational practices and the reliability of underlying infrastructures; Inclusive decision-making that balances the (assumed) objectivity of data-driven algorithms and the influence of different stakeholder groups; Exception and accountability in how digital and AI platforms are funded, developed, implemented and used; and a Complete understanding of people and events through the integration of traditionally dispersed data sources and systems, and how policy actors seek to mitigate the risks associated with this aspiration.

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“…Similarly, Anders's study (2015) revealed that the Malawi Government has emphasised the aspects of efficiency and transparency in the public sector through the implementation of technologies ("process" -Figure 3). In fact, the implementation of clean government in Africa, in general, has been hindered by bureaucratic practices and corruption (Anders, 2015).…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Audit sampling strategies and frauds: an evidence from Africa

Nagirikandalage

Binsardi

Kooli

2021

MAJ

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Purpose This paper aims to investigate how professionals such as accountants, auditors, senior civil servants and academics perceive the use of audit sampling strategies adopted by professionals to increase detection rates of frauds and corruption within the public sector in Africa. It also examines the respondents’ perceived values regarding the reasons for committing frauds, types of fraud and corruption, as well as the aspects of audit sampling strategies to tackle frauds. Design/methodology/approach This research uses non-parametric statistics and logistic regression to analyse the respondents’ opinions regarding the state of frauds and corruption in Africa (particularly in Tunisia and non-Tunisia countries), the common factors behind people committing frauds, including the types of frauds and corruption and the respondents’ opinions on the use of audit sampling strategies (non-random and random) to examine the instances of frauds and corruption. Findings The findings indicate that most respondents prefer to use non-probabilistic audit sampling rather than more robust sampling strategies such as random sampling and systematic random sampling to detect frauds and corruption. In addition, although there are some minor statistical differences between the countries in terms of the respondents’ perceived values on skimming fraud and on the use of audit random sampling to tackle rampant corruption in Africa, the overall findings indicate that opinions do not significantly differ between the respondents from Tunisia and other countries in terms of the types of fraud, the reasons for committing fraud and the auditing sampling strategies used to investigate the frauds. Research limitations/implications This research serves as an analytical exploratory study to instigate further audit sampling research to combat rampant fraud and corruption in the public sector in Africa. Originality/value There are few or non-existent studies investigating the application of audit sampling strategies in Africa countries, particularly to examine the application of audit random sampling and audit non-random sampling strategies to detect fraudulent activities and corruption. Correspondingly, this research carries strategic implications for accountants and auditors to successfully detect fraudulent activities and corruption in Africa.

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The normativity of numbers in practice: technologies of counting, accounting and auditing in Malawi's civil service reform

Cited by 10 publications

References 12 publications

The intersection between ‘The Audit Society’ and public sector corruption and fraud: – a literature review and future research agenda

The intersection between ‘The Audit Society’ and public sector corruption and fraud: – a literature review and future research agenda

Digital discretion and public administration in Africa: Implications for the use of artificial intelligence

Audit sampling strategies and frauds: an evidence from Africa

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