The expectation that Courts of Accounts would induce improvements in Public
Governance w
Name: ELIANE CABRINI RAMALHO
Publication date: 07/08/2026
Examining board:
Name |
Role |
|---|---|
| DOUGLAS RORIZ CALIMAN | Examinador Interno |
| EDILBERTO CARLOS PONTES LIMA | Examinador Externo |
| MARIELCE DE CASSIA RIBEIRO TOSTA | Presidente |
Summary: The expectation that Courts of Accounts would induce improvements in Public
Governance within their jurisdictional entities encountered, in the Brazilian case, a
knowledge base still dispersed regarding how state and municipal courts effectively
assessed such governance and which parameters would render these practices
comparable at the national scale. The literature concentrated on the federal level and
left open the practices of the remaining courts, exposing a relevant risk for external
control: assessments that confer legitimacy upon the evaluating body without
producing transformation in the evaluated entity. Against this backdrop, the
dissertation investigated how Brazilian State and Municipal Courts of Accounts
assessed the Organizational Public Governance (OPG) of their jurisdictional entities
and identified parameters capable of orienting the standardization, comparability, and
improvement of these practices. The research adopted a qualitative approach,
exploratory, descriptive, and documentary in nature, organized into two
complementary stages. The first consisted of a comparative documentary analysis of
seven national and international normative frameworks, structured around eight
analytical dimensions of Organizational Public Governance: purpose/mission, public
value/results, leadership/integrity, strategy/direction, control/accountability,
transparency, participation/inclusion, and risks and sustainability — classified
according to a five-level adherence scale. The second comprised a survey of the
evaluative practices of the Brazilian Courts of Accounts, conducted through an
institutional questionnaire submitted to their ombudsman offices pursuant to Federal
Law No. 12,527/2011 (Freedom of Information Act). The findings from both stages
were articulated through triangulation. The results revealed structural correspondence
between the gaps in the normative field and the gaps in declared practices: the
dimensions least consolidated in external control frameworks — notably
participation/inclusion and public value — proved equally absent from the courts'
declared practices. Three mechanisms explained this pattern: mimetic isomorphism
toward the Federal Court of Accounts (TCU), which disseminated legitimacy without
breadth; decoupling between practice and institutionalization, which limited the
communicability of results; and structural heterogeneity among court categories, which
conditioned the reach of induction. It was concluded that the OPG inductive function
exercised by Brazilian Courts of Accounts was incipient, fragmented, and asymmetric,
and that its strengthening requires broader normative coverage of the eight
dimensions, formalization of methodologies, publication of results, and standardization
of a minimum reference framework among courts.
