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Abdullah Al Mahmud Democracy which is thought to be the best form of governments can go in vein if is not implemented properly.

One of the basic conditions of implementing democracy is to ensure accountability of government as well as political parties to people. Democracy without accountability is like a train without break. This truth has been focused by Mahmoud Ezzamel, Noel Hyndman, Age Johnsen and Irvine Lapsley in their book Accounting in Politics which was first published in 2008 by Routledge in UK, USA & Canada. Written by internationally renowned authors, this book documents and discusses the impact of devolution, new public management and modern public sector accounting reforms on decision-making and democratic accountability. A welcome addition to the existing literature on new public management, in this book the authors have used a range of sources, including more than seventy interviews with political representatives in parliaments and national assemblies, advisors and member governments and executives in five countries to explore the continuing changes in governance and governing and their spread to new nations and areas of activity. This book studies the role of accounting in informing and shaping the democratic accountability of actions for key agents in politics. It is explored how accounting is affected by a modernizing public management culture and the New Public Management (NPM) movement and how accounting relates to non-accounting forms of accountability. The book investigates the emergence and development of accounting practices and the meanings attributed to these developments for democratic accountability. It studies the annual budgeting, performance management and performance audit reporting processes, and the connections between budgeting and reporting. Specifically, it is interested in examining the linkages between mission statements, objectives and targets in the planning process and the use of performance measures and indicators in the reporting process. The macro wholeof-government level is distinguished from the micro agency level. The book also focuses on the devolved governments and parliaments as affected by whole of government budgeting. This book looks at the effectiveness of the 1999 restructuring of the UK through the establishment of the Scottish Parliament and the Assemblies for Northern Ireland and Wales, considering the process of devolution and its consequences on the key mechanisms of accounting and democratic accountability. Many of the chapters in this book examine whether devolution is enhancing democratic accountability, or creating a fragmentary state with conflict and tensions between the Westminster government and the devolved bodies. The focus is on the financial mechanisms for democratic accountability both in the UK and in international comparator countries (New Zealand, Norway and the US). The book examines the turbulent pattern of relationships between central and devolved government and explores whether the present arrangements for devolution in the UK represent an end game, or whether they may be merely a stepping stone to a more fully fledged federal state. It is argued that the main thrust of many of the financial reforms in the UK has confounded, obfuscated and complicated the desire for democratic accountability. In this book there are eleven chapters with significant informations. Chapter 1 pen pictures an overview of the book as described by the authors: devolution and democratic accountability. Chapter 2 examines the tensions around the implications of the devolution settlement for Westminster. The discussion of the Westminster model of government in this chapter includes its shaping by early and more recent history, followed by an exploration of its distinctive nature. The processes of devolution are considered in chapter 3. The authors argue that in the UK, the process of devolution has a long history. It goes back to 1886, when the Liberal leader William Gladstone proposed the Home Rule for Ireland.

Accountability in the UK devolved parliaments is discussed in chapter 4. The empirical analysis of how politicians, civil servants and other actors involved in the devolved institutions understand and make sense of the changes in accountability, showed the merits and achievements of the process as well as the problems that still remain to be resolved. Then the authors examine a series of study settings, in detail, both within the devolved settings and in international comparisons. In chapters 5, 6 and 7 respectively, they examine the experiences of devolution and democratic accountability in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. New Zealand is widely recognized as being at the forefront of international public management developments, and its experiences are discussed in chapter 8. In the Scandinavian countries, there is a strong democratic tradition of accountability which is quite distinct from the conventional view of the NPM paradigm of enhanced managerial accountability. The experiences of Norway in the exercise of parliamentary accountability are discussed in chapter 9. The authors then turn to the US experiences of fiscal and democratic accountability to consider the US model of budgetary accountability in chapter 10. Finally, in chapter 11, they conclude on the devolution outcome and likely prospects, given the documented experiences, both within the UK and internationally. This book is an indispensable resource for students of all levels studying public finance accounting, public ownership, nationalization and devolution. The resulting work will be of interest to students and researchers who are engaged in examining UK devolution and, more particularly, those with a concern related to resource accounting and budgeting issues. It will also make fascinating reading for civil servants and politicians involved in the devolution process. Thats why I should recommend the readers to go through this book and I believe it will be worthwhile. Student of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science department at North South University.

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