Transparency of Public Governance Practices at Federal Universities

Abstract

Public transparency is essential to ensure the reliability and credibility of democratic institutions. It is a principle of effective public governance, which presupposes policies planned in a predictable, open and transparent way. This article is developed on two important themes for the public sector: transparency and public governance. Focusing on the dissemination of information about public governance practices developed by federal universities, this research questions whether HEIs are transparent about the governance mechanisms used in university management. Therefore, the transparency of public governance practices of Federal Universities in the southern region of Brazil was analyzed. A 32-item checklist was prepared

to assess the transparency of governance practices of leadership, strategy and control mechanisms, as evidenced in the universities' Management Report for the year 2020. A Governance Practices Transparency Index was created ( ITPG), which varies between 0 and 1. The results show that most universities have moderate and high levels of transparency of governance practices, when evaluated by the consolidated ITPG transparency index. However, when analyzed in a disaggregated way, the indicators of each mechanism show gaps to be filled by the universities to improve the transparency of the governance practiced by the university management, especially in the mechanisms of Leadership and Control.