Marc Robinson Blog

Does PFM need to be rebuilt?

- March 21, 2024 | March 22, 2024 - Marc Robinson 3 Comments

Contemporary public financial management (PFM) is, according to an emerging school of thought, in a parlous condition and needs a complete rebuild. I disagree. An influential recent formulation of the views of this school of…

Monitoring & Evaluation

“Government Analytics” vs M&E

- November 22, 2023 | November 22, 2023 - Marc Robinson comment

To what extent can digitalization give us what we need to properly measure government performance? What follows is the last in a series addressing this question, as well as a closely associated question: should we…

Monitoring & Evaluation / PFM

Quality Measurement & Digitalization

- November 16, 2023 | November 13, 2023 - Marc Robinson comment

What opportunities does digitalization offer for better measures of output quality in the public sector? This question is the focus of what follows – the second in a series examining the extent to which digitalization…

Monitoring & Evaluation

Digitalization and Performance Measurement

- November 10, 2023 | November 17, 2023 - Marc Robinson comment

Digitalization improves public sector performance. But to what extent does it also enhance performance measurement? To what extent can digitalization give us what we need to properly measure government performance? These are questions that I…

Budgeting / Fiscal policy / PFM / Uncategorized

A Net Worth Rule: Higher Debt for Higher…

- May 9, 2023 | May 9, 2023 - Marc Robinson 1 Comment

Yet another call for governments to abandon debt limits and focus instead on net worth! This time it’s in the United Kingdom, where an influential think tank, the Resolution Foundation, has proposed the replacement of…

Budgeting / Fiscal policy / PFM

Ending the Confusion on Medium-Term Expenditure Ceilings

- April 13, 2023 | April 14, 2023 - Marc Robinson comment

Expenditure ceilings are a key instrument for achieving the objectives of medium-term budgeting. This is why the question of how to set appropriate and workable expenditure ceilings has been a major focus of public financial…

Budgeting / Government Expenditure / PFM

Budget Baselines & Public Employment

- September 25, 2022 | September 25, 2022 - Marc Robinson comment

Knowing the budget baseline is an essential part of good budgeting, which makes the methodology for estimating the baseline important. What follows focuses on the need, in many countries, to include within the baseline estimation…

Budgeting / PFM

Zombie Ideas in Public Financial Management

- August 8, 2022 | August 6, 2022 - Marc Robinson 2 Comments

Zombie ideas – the term Paul Krugman coined for ideas that make no sense but refuse to die – are not confined to economics. There are also a few to be found in the field…

Budgeting / PFM

Attacking Budgetary Incrementalism

- April 13, 2022 | March 18, 2022 - Marc Robinson comment

There is wide agreement that attacking budgetary incrementalism is an important objective of budget reform. But when we go into battle against incrementalism, we need to be clear on what exactly we are fighting against.…

Budgeting / Performance Budgeting / PFM

Unit Cost Budgeting: Use Selectively (4/4)

- February 1, 2022 | February 1, 2022 - Marc Robinson comment

The idea that governments should base their budgets on output unit costs is very influential. Everywhere in the world one finds people who think that unit costs are the key to making performance budgeting work.…