TY  - JOUR
A1  - van Helden, Jan
A1  - Reichard, Christoph
T1  - Management control and public sector performance management
T2  - Baltic Journal of Management
N2  - Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether and how evolving ideas about management control (MC) emerge in research about public sector performance management (PSPM).

Design/methodology/approach
This is a literature review on PSPM research through using a set of key terms derived from a review of recent developments in MC.

Findings
MC research, originating in the management accounting discipline, is largely disconnected from PSPM research as part of public administration and public management disciplines. Overlaps between MC and PSPM research are visible in a cybernetic control approach, control variety and contingency-based reasoning. Both academic communities share an understanding of certain issues, although under diverging labels, especially enabling controls or, in a more general sense, usable performance controls, horizontal controls and control packaging. Specific MC concepts are valuable for future PSPM research, i.e. trust as a complement of performance-based controls in complex settings, and strategy as a variable in contingency-based studies.

Research limitations/implications
Breaking the boundaries between two currently remote research disciplines, on the one hand, might dismantle “would-be” innovations in one of these disciplines, and, on the other hand, may provide a fertile soil for mutual transfer of knowledge. A limitation of the authors’ review of PSPM research is that it may insufficiently cover research published in the public sector accounting journals, which could be an outlet for MC-inspired PSPM research.

Originality/value
The paper unravels the “apparent” and “real” differences between MC and PSPM research, and, in doing so, takes the detected “real” differences as a starting point for discussing in what ways PSPM research can benefit from MC achievements.
KW  - Public sector
KW  - Performance management
KW  - Management control
Y1  - 2018
UR  - https://publishup.uni-potsdam.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/50458
SN  - 1746-5265
SN  - 1746-5273
VL  - 14
IS  - 1
SP  - 158
EP  - 176
PB  - Emerald Group Publishing Limited
CY  - Bingley
ER  -