With an assembly of articles written by internationally renowned scholars and experts, Evaluation in Public Sector Reform is unique in its broad geographical range. It explores countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden and the USA, as well as categorically addressing countries which have so far remained conspicuously neglected in the international debate including: the Netherlands, Germany, Italy as Continental European countries, Japan and Latin America. This unusually broad focus brings to the fore the double function which evaluation has typically acquired in the context of public sector reforms: its twofold mission is, on the one hand, to create transparency - promoting internal tools and procedures in public administration and, on the other, to produce external evaluative information, analyses and research on the processes and results of public sector reforms. So, evaluation is experiencing a new ('third) wave, which is explicitly shown in this book.
1. Evaluation in Public Sector Reform: Toward a 'Third Wave of Evaluation? 2. Evaluating Public Management Reforms: An International Perspective 3. Evaluating Best Practice in Central Government Modernization 4. Evaluating Public Management Reforms in Central Government: Norway, Sweden and the United States of America 5. Public-sector Reform and Evaluation in Australia and New Zealand 6. Evaluation and New Public Management in the Netherlands 7. Evaluation and Public-sector Reform in Germany: Leaps and Lags 8. 'As a Voluntary Choice or as a Legal Obligation: Assessing New Public Management Policy in Italy 9. The Late and Sudden Emergence of New Public Management Reforms in Japan 10. Evaluating Public-sector Reforms in Latin America 11. Learning from Evaluation Practice: The Case of Public-sector Reforms 12. Evaluation in Public-sector Reform: From Country Profiles to Common Trends in International Perspective