Budgeting And Financial Management In The Federal Government

"Budgeting and financial management in the U.S. federal government is highly complex and highly differentiated, e.g., in the process employed by the Executive branch versus those used by Congress. In this book we attempt to cover the processes of both the Executive and Congress and the relationships between the two. The book provides views from several perspectives, e.g., managerial and political. We attempt to provide readers with an understanding of how federal budget and financial management processes are supposed to operate. However, we then go a step further to show how these processes actually operate often in contrast to the intended template. Additionally, this book is intended to capture and combine the views of the academic and the practitioner, including those of the participants in the process."--Introduction.

The right turn in U. S. politics has increased conflict over both ends and means in government budgeting and financial management. Overlapping and competing views of the way the world works drive finance officials’ practice. Taking a new look at public financial management that acknowledges the multiple, competing realities, Government Budgeting and Financial Management in Practice: Logics to Make Sense of Ambiguity examines transaction cost economics and other small government, managed-by-the-market techniques as the latest reincarnation of public budgeting and financial management orthodoxy. Gerald J. Miller reviews new research on the continuing validity of the political dimension of government finance decisions and the multiple, intensely argued constructions of reality the finance official must make sense of. Miller discusses major advances in interpretive approaches to budgeting and finance and how they dominate writing in the broader field of public administration. He also examines the effects of the explosion of information systems, new budget techniques, nonconventional ways of spending, and new technologies. The book uses a question as the motivating force to understand some facets of today’s government budgeting, finance, and financial management: where do the critical assumptions come from to drive financial management? Miller takes the history of reform, developments in the field and the logics finance officials say they use as sources for these assumptions and examines what they reveal about constructions of the government finance world. Exploring new avenues of financial management thinking, the book discusses ambiguity and interpretations that move the unclear preferences, ends, and goals toward consensus. The author identifies an alternative approach to research that explains important facets of financial management. This approach is drawn directly from practice, events and problems in public organizations and from the creedal bent of many political actors in competition.

The U.S. Department of Defense accounts for over half of federal government discretionary spending and over 3% of GDP. Half of all federal employees work for the Department. The annual budget for the military not only provides for those salaries, it covers the baseline and wartime operating expenses of the force, and hundreds of billions of dollars of investment in new capabilities and technologies. Given the materiality of the defense function and amount of resources it consumes, the processes for budgeting for defense and managing the funds is important to understand. This text provides a fully integrated view of defense budgeting. It takes the position that defense budgeting is a specific instance of public budgeting, and public budgeting is a specific instance of public policy. In order to fully understand how the nation budgets for defense, it first lays a theoretical and conceptual foundation for public policy and public budgeting. That is followed by an assessment of the political and policy context for defense, including the overarching federal budget process and role of Congress in setting defense policy. Only then does the text explore the specifics of defense budgeting: how, by whom, and why the budget is crafted. Beyond the topic of budgeting – formulating, requesting, and legitimating the request for funds – the book tackles financial management topics. Included are discussions of federal appropriations law, funds management, accounting requirements, intragovernmental business transactions, and contemporary topics of defense policy such as funding overseas contingency operations in an era of deficit control legislation. This book is an appropriate reference for both students and practitioners of defense budgeting and financial management. It would also be appropriate in a general public budgeting course. Most public budgeting texts focus on state and municipal governments and there are few that address the federal system. This book fills that gap and provides a specific example of federal budgeting.

Acknowledgements. Chapter I: National Defense Policy and Resource Decision Making: Unique Challenges. Chapter II: The Federal Government Budget Process. Chapter III: Budgeting for National Defense: Complicated but Workable. Chapter IV: The Planning, Programming, Budgeting, Execution System.

Edited by A. Premchand, this collection of seminar papers and country studies examines recent developments in government accounting and financial management in selected industrial and developing countries. The country studies include Australia, Canada, China, India, Poland, Sweden, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Latin American countries.