The complexity of the public sector generated by the mobilisation and use of significant financial resources, national cultural factors, the heterogeneity of the provision of public services, the numerous interested parties, the increasing demand for the quality of public services, the information asymmetry, require an actor to provide credible assurance regarding the proper management of public financial resources. In this context, performance audits are the link between public sector entities and stakeholders. The research has two components: the first component analyzes the degree of harmonization of the regulations specific to the performance audit in Romania with the International Standards of Supreme Audit Institutions (ISSAI); the second component analyses the degree of transparency of performance audit information by the SAIs of the EU Member States, through their official websites. In this regard, we have resorted to an in-depth longitudinal study, content analysis and disclosure index. The research results highlighted that the Romanian SAI has adopted in its normative framework the foremost ISSAI provisions on performance audit and the harmonization degree has systematically improved correlative with the regulatory revisions. The degree of disclosure for performance audit-specific information by the EU member state SAIs is high.

The present paper is materialized in an empirical study concerning the impact of the internal audit on the accounting system and its reliability, in case of public universities in Romania. In order to achieve the study, it was necessary to know the different points of view of the representatives of the accounting departments of public institutions of academic education, using a statistical survey based on questionnaire. The research objectives were focused on obtaining conclusions regarding: the importance of internal auditing of the accounting system and its reliability; the extent to which the internal audit manages to provide reasonable assurances regarding the accounting and financial activity; the importance in auditing of the items related to the accounting activity; the assurance and the adequacy of the human resources allocated to the internal audit departments; the frequency with which the internal audit reports projects are modified in order to follow the audited structure recommendations; the extent to which the audit reports reflect the reality; the internal audit activity contribution in improving the accounting systems and their reliability in the Romanian universities.

The premise of the research is represented by the importance of the external public audit, as a specific activity that the supreme audit institutions carry out at the level of the public sector entities, in order to provide to interested parties, assurances regarding the management of the public resources of these entities. The research objectives are two-dimensional and the research methodology is qualitative and interpretive. The first dimension aims to identify the conceptual connotations of the external public audit in the specialized literature. The second dimension represents a multicriteria comparative analysis regarding the typology of the external public audit carried out by the supreme institutions of the European Union member states. The study is carried out regarding all the 27 member states, information regarding the United Kingdom, which has recently left the European Union, being also presented and analyzed. The research results showed that, although the applied audit methods vary, convergent elements have been identified, so that the typology of the external public audit also validates the European Union "unity in diversity" motto, at the level of the specific activities of the supreme audit institutions in the community area. On the background of an area of undoubted importance, but limited in terms of research, this scientific demarche represents a major challenge for both the academic and the socio-economic environment. Thus, the conceptual valences of the external public audit will be complemented and an increase of credibility and relevance will be generated in the manner of supervising the public financial resources' management of the public sector entities at the level of the European Union member states, in the context of the economic turbulences and the rising demand for public services manifested at European and international level.

Research Question: What is the impact of the performance audit missions on the activity of the Romanian public institutions? Motivation: Public resources' management and use, public sector entities' performance, in the context of the economic environment turbulences and of the complexity and heterogeneity of the public services demand are of interest to a wide range of interested parties. Thus, the informational valences of the performance audit represent for the public sector management, a credible and relevant information source to substantiate the decision-making process focused on performance and circumscribed to the community members. Idea: The paper includes an empirical research on the investigation of the public sector management perception regarding the impact of the performance audit missions performed by the Romanian Court of Accounts, on the public institutions activity. Data: Information regarding the performed missions and the entities subject to performance audit was collected by reviewing the Romanian Court of Accounts' portfolio of publications (available online on the institution's official website). The email addresses of the respondents were collected by consulting the official web pages of the audited entities (contact section). Tools: The research is based on the study of the public sector management’s perception regarding the performance audit missions performed by the Romanian Court of Accounts. In this regard, we developed and disseminated questionnaires to the management of public sector entities subject to performance audit within the period 2015-2019. Complementarily, in order to identify the tendencies and the respondents’ homogeneous perceptions, the descriptive analysis is completed by cluster analysis and multidimensional scaling. Data processing, clustering and the results’ analysis were performed using the SPSS statistical software. Findings: The research results show that performance auditing contributes to improving the economicity, efficiency and effectiveness in the public resources use, but its usefulness is inversely proportional to the professional experience of the respondents within the audited entity. The respondents also consider that the performance audits’ objectives are appropriate to the sensitive areas related to the activity of public institutions, and their results provide a fair image regarding the public resources' management and use. Concerning the performance audit reports, the respondents consider them objective, rigorous, credible, and the collaboration and communication of the auditors with the entity are appreciated as successful elements of the performance audit missions. Contribution: The paper adds value to the specialized literature, given that the performance audit issue in the vision of the public sector management has not been addressed in Romania, being also limited internationally. The research results are also of interest to both the professional and the socio-economic environment, concerned with the public sector entities performance.

At international level there is a clear concern for the comparative analysis of the academic education systems of the member states of the European Union. In this context, through this work we intend to bring into the attention of those interested a comparative study of the funding mechanism of academic education in Romania and Spain, aiming to highlight the convergence elements and the particular aspects of each of the two financing models. For this, our debate will begin with the presentation of the two paradigms of financing, aiming to capture the essence aspects and then we shall focus on a multi-criteria comparative analysis. The end of our presentation will be reserved for conclusions through which we will highlight the results of our research.