Nogueira, Sónia P.Jorge, SusanaMarques, RenaldoViana, Luís Cracel2026-02-042026-02-042025Nogueira, S. P.; Jorge, S.; Marques, R.; Viana, L. (2025). The Role of Politicians in PSA reforms: the Case of Central Administration in Portugal. In 10th GECAMB/P-CSEAR & XXIV Grudis Conference and Doctoral Colloquium: book of abstracts. Bragança: IPB. ISBN: 978-972-745-350-4. p. 58-59978-972-745-350-4http://hdl.handle.net/10198/35677This paper takes the standpoint of politicians as supposedly promotors of public sector accounting reforms, given that they approve the main legal acts allowing the change to happen, and they are responsible for the governance and management of public administration. The analysis seeks to understand how politicians’ acting in those reforms, namely by the issuance of legal acts and reports, contributes to the success or failure as ultimate outcome of the process. The research takes the case of Portugal as reference, where reforms have started from the coercive institutional pressure of Troika in 2011, and an IPSAS-based system was legally approved in 2015. The paper is framed by institutional approaches, drawing on document content analysis of legislation and reports concerning the State Budget and the State General Account, published after 2015. It brings as innovation the use of accounting language to assess the reform implementation, because is analyses the implementation of change through the identification of accrual accounting vocabulary reflected in those documents.engGovernmental accountingIPSAS adoptionReform processesAccounting languageInstitutional changeDecouplingconference object