The measurement of operating results in the public sector: a systematic revaluation and academic interpretation of performance aspects

Abstract

With the recognition of the limitation in the literature of public sector accounting in the world as well as in Vietnam, this research aims to identify and analyse the emerging literature on the performance measurement (PM) in the public sector (PS) and shed a light for other research in the future. The systematic literature review (SLR) methodology proposed by Denyer and Tranfield (2009) was applied with a total of 80 papers published in 38 scientific journals for evaluating and establishing current trends. Apart from indicating an increasing demand on a better understanding in PM of PS despite regionally heterogeneous, vision and mission for improving performance, the results also revealed gaps stemming from choice of number as well as the type of keywords and journals through seven categories in those research trends. Taking these results into account, academics can keep on exploring this type of subject area on their own topic, while practitioners and policy makers can employ in their empirical work.