Accountability – being responsible for one’s actions – is easier when one measures one’s own performance.
Deceptively easier.
That’s the clear lesson from the example of a South Carolina school district that reported astonishing testing progress – until progress measurement shifted from the district to a third party. In the assessment of independent evaluators, supposed gains disappeared.
(For more on the episode, see http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2008/09/12/the-fraudulence-of-bureaucratic-accountability/)
This isn’t just an example of suspicious academic accomplishment – it’s a problem of government and corporations everywhere.
You will hear, endlessly, how professional and responsible and selfless public officials are.
I might be persuaded if much of the praise didn’t come from the officials and their friends, about themselves and their friends.
This sort of accountability is no accountability at all.
In some of the posts over these next few days, I’ll present another side of the story on so-called accountability.