I sistemi di controllo di gestione nelle amministrazioni centrali

V Chapters that deal with the general analysis end with the definition of study elements of the performance management system in Italian Ministries; the reported data are either extrapolated from local and foreign literature and from various experiences. Firstly, the three key elements for management control are analysed: - organizational structure; - planning, programming and control cycle; - accounting system. Later, the key elements of the control model itself are examined: - system architecture - both vertical and horizontal; - cost model (how costs are collected, filed and allocated); - indicators model; - reporting system. After defining the analysis context, mainly derived from literature, the empirical part of this thesis begins; the Italian perspective is taken into account, with the goal of clarifying these main research questions: • What is the stage of performance management systems in the Italian Central Government? Did they meet any kind of obstacle during their implementation? How can these obstacles be removed? • Which are the control model features? Why have they been chosen? Are there polarizations in those choices? • Is the performance management system actually used? How can its use be stimulated? In order to answer these questions the research approach is divided into two steps: • extensive and empirical analysis of the Italian Ministries; • case studies. In the phase of the extensive and empirical analysis, for each Ministry considered, a global picture is given. This picture includes the main characteristics of the context, the choices carried out for the definition of the control model and the stage of development of the performance management system. In order to reach this result, two different activities are fulfilled: 1. analysis of documentation supplied by the Ministries themselves, performed according to the principles of content analysis; 2. telephone survey, in order to complete and validate information collected. When a detailed picture of the characteristics and of the present application of the performance management system in every Minister is obtained, the research proceeds with an inter-crossed analysis of all the studied variables. The result is a classification of the Ministries that summarizes the current situation of the performance management systems in the Italian Central Governments. The second phase of the analysis, carried out in order to wholly answer the research questions, is based on multiple case studies, performed through personal interviews. These unstructured