Burdens of transparency: An analysis of public sector internal auditing
| Published date | 01 September 2020 |
| Author | Catherine Liston‐Heyes,Luc Juillet |
| Date | 01 September 2020 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/padm.12654 |
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Burdens of transparency: An analysis of public
sector internal auditing
Catherine Liston-Heyes|Luc Juillet
Graduate School of Public and International
Affairs, University of Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Correspondence
Catherine Liston-Heyes, Graduate School of
Public and International Affairs, University of
Ottawa, Social Sciences Building,
120 Université, Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6 N5
Canada.
Email: clistonh@uottawa.ca
Funding information
This work was supported by the Government
Internal Auditors Council of Canada (GIACC)
(Grant title: Enhancing the Value of Internal
Auditing in the Public Sector). GIACC
Secretariat, c/o Institute of Internal Auditors,
305–955 Green Valley Cres., Ottawa, ON,
K2C 3 V4.
Abstract
Transparency is largely seen as essential to public sector
accountability. Yet, information disclosure also generates
unintended consequences that may prove detrimental to
the workings of some accountability processes. In this light,
we investigate the views of Canadian public sector internal
auditors, a subset of professionals fulfilling an important
accountability function. We show that concerns surround-
ing disclosure requirements are prevalent. We demonstrate
that internal auditors who see public disclosure require-
ments as a barrier to their effectiveness are more likely to
be and/or perceive their organization to be risk averse, to
feel professionally isolated and to favour a greater role for
data analytics in accountability processes. However, audi-
tors who would like to see their profession play a greater
advisory role in their organization view public disclosure in
a more positive light. We argue that understanding who is
resisting helps identify threats to accountability mecha-
nisms, improves the design of transparency policies and
facilitates implementation.
1|INTRODUCTION
In the public sector, transparency is closely associated with good governance. It is commonly seen as central to the
fight against corruption, waste and mismanagement, while also encouraging greater citizen participation in govern-
ment (Worthy 2010). For some, government accountability is impossible without transparency since ‘people cannot
be held accountable if we do not know what they are doing’(Bannister and Connolly 2011, p. 3). As a result, many
jurisdictions have adopted laws obliging their administrations to release many of their internal documents to the pub-
lic upon request and to conduct as great a share of their business as possible in the open (Roberts 2005; Worthy
2010; Michener and Bersh 2013).
Received: 9 July 2019Revised: 5 December 2019Accepted: 13 January 2020
DOI: 10.1111/padm.12654
Public Admin. 2020;98:659–674.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/padm© 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd659
Yet transparency can create risks for public organizations, generating unintended and sometimes unexpected
costs and consequences. First, even when the information disclosed improves accountability, that can create infor-
mation overload and confusion, undermining trust in public organizations and possibly leading to the ‘delegitimiza-
tion’of government actions (Roberts 2009; Grimmelikhuijsen and Meijer 2012; Worthy 2015). Second, transparency
can negatively impact the operations within an organization, for example by encouraging defensive thinking and
excessive caution (Bannister and Connolly 2011), stifling deliberations among policy-makers (Michener and Bersch
2013), reducing government responsiveness, increasing management indecisiveness (Koppell 2005), and promoting
an excessive focus on visible performance indicators to the detriment of more complex and meaningful assessment
of organizational success (Power 2000; Strathern 2000). Finally, and paradoxically, more disclosure can reduce the
effectiveness of public organizations' accountability mechanisms. For example, studies have found that transparency
can lead to the emergence of informal procedures that erode compliance (Roberts 2005). It can also encourage the
avoidance of accountability through ‘blame games’(Hood 2009; Roberts 2009; Worthy 2015) and, in some cases, a
resistance to document conferred advice and decision-making processes (Worthy 2010).
Given their potential negative impacts, we expect some public servants to have legitimate concerns about trans-
parency. Determining empirically how pervasive these are, and the characteristics of those expressing them is impor-
tant for public sector organizations. Public servants who apprehend the effects that disclosure policies will have on
their ability to do their work are presumably more likely to try to minimize the risks disclosure entails to themselves
and their organizations. This could involve engaging in ‘gaming behaviour’, failing to properly document government
operations, or resisting complying with disclosure requirements altogether. Moreover, since public servants' attitudes
influence the implementation of reforms (Reichborn-Kjennerud 2013; Campbell 2018), identifying who is concerned
about the emergence of public disclosure policies can ultimately improve their design and implementation, and high-
light related training needs. Such insights can reduce the costs and unintended consequences of transparency initia-
tives and facilitate their ‘internalization’(Arellano-Gault and Lepore 2011).
This study examines the cognitive barriers of public servants to open government, building on the work of Wirtz
et al. (2016). In their investigation of the German public sector, they found that employees who perceive greater
legal, organizational and personal risks associated with the disclosure of government information are more likely to
resist, and even reject, open government policies. Like Wirtz et al., we examine employee attitudes and perceptions
in relation to disclosure policies, but we focus exclusively on the views of internal auditors, a subset of public ser-
vants who are particularly well placed to observe the trade-offs implied by the adoption of such policies.
Unlike legislative auditors who work on behalf of parliamentarians and write their documents with public dis-
semination in mind (Arena and Jeppesen 2010), internal auditors report their findings to their organization's chief
executive, often through an audit committee. They are independent of the employees and managers whose work
they audit but they remain an internal function. Their task is to provide assurance to the chief executive that the
organization's risks and resources are well managed and to report on fraud, waste and, increasingly, performance
(Power 2003; Government of Canada 2018). Internal audit reports are meant both to support administrative
accountability and to help with the continuous improvement of organizations. Hence, by design, internal audit
reports contain information that is critical of public organizations and not intended for public dissemination.
Since disclosure policies are making this information increasingly accessible to the public, we should expect a
certain amount of dissent from public sector internal auditors. To what extent do they believe that public disclosure
policies limit their ability to communicate their findings effectively? Moreover, who, among this community, is more
likely to be concerned about the impact these policies exert on this accountability mechanism? To the best of our
knowledge, there exists no empirical study examining how transparency requirements affect audit workers' ability to
carry out their duties.
We investigate these questions through a survey of internal auditors working in the Canadian public sector. We
have two main empirical objectives. First, we determine the extent to which public sector internal auditors feel ham-
pered in their communications by public disclosure requirements. Second, using ordered logit regression analyses,
we evaluate the relationship between internal auditors' concerns with public disclosure and other beliefs, attitudes
660 LISTON-HEYES AND JUILLET
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