Democratic Origins of Auditing: "Good Auditing" in Democratic Perspectives

Abstract

This paper addresses the democratic origins of auditing of the public sector and aim at developing a concept of “Good Auditing” based on democratic theories. The paper argues that the normative characteristics of auditing found in the literature, such as independence and professionalism, are well founded in democracy theory. The unclearness of the role and responsibility of auditors is argued to be a consequence of both uncertainty of the main principle and how the accountability process of auditing should be arranged, as well as changes in the professions attitude towards the scope of the audit objectives. From a democratic perspective there is need for auditors to recognize the citizens as the principle, which implies fulfilling the people’s expectations of their role as well as aiming at limiting mismanagement of the public sector. This requires a higher ambition than merely report to the administrative management and elected politicians. “Good Auditing” is defined the following way: Good auditing of the public sector is distinguished by recognizing the people as the principal, independence to the auditee and professionalism in the exercise of the audit practice.