Abstract

The American system has deep roots, beginning with the vote in Congress in favour of a famous bill, an initiative of a bipartisan Commission of the Senate, passed on 3 January 1993: the Government Performance & Result Act. The most significant aspect of this law lay in the obligation it gave to every federal governmental agency to reconsider its whole program me of activity and budget, and to reform everything in a systematic way, through a new document labelled the 'Strategic Plan', having a time limit of no less that 5 years. From the 2006/7 financial year, in spite of the difficult beginnings and incompatibilities, a concrete link was forged between strategic planning and the drawing up of annual budgets.