Contesting Public Service Fiduciary Accountability

Abstract

Every public service function attracts fiduciary accountability. The public/private distinction does not imply any variation in the application of the conventional proscription on opportunism. I have explained that elsewhere. Here I situate my analysis by contrasting the views that other writers recently have advanced. The approach usually employed by those commentators is to consider whether it is tenable or useful to extend ‘private’ fiduciary accountability to the ‘public’ sphere. The difficulty with several of the contributions is that they assert distorted conceptions of the conventional regulation. I will explain the main analytical departures in each case. I conclude that none of the contributions transcend the conventional formulation.