Introduction

Hence the relevance for the 1990s of this study of the way in which performance indicators (PIs) were developed in the 1980s. Performance indicators were only one element in the overall strategy of making evaluation a feature of the new Whitehall structure. But they were an essential part. If there is to be value for money, then the activities and

outputs of government have to be measured; if there is to be more accountability, then there has to be an accepted currency of evaluation; if there is to be decentralisation, and blocks of work are to be hived off without loss of control, then there has to be a way of assessing performance. So it is not surprising that the Prime Minister decreed in the 1982 Financial Management Initiative (FMI)—the manifesto of the revolution-that a thousand PIs should flourish, and that ever since they have indeed multiplied throughout Whitehall. The evolution of the PI system therefore provides an insight into the whole process of change in British Government.