Public secrecy in auditing: What government auditors cannot know

This paper critically examines government auditing through use of Taussig's [Taussig M. Defacement: public secrecy and the labor of the negative. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press; 1999] observations regarding the “public secret”, or “knowing what not to know” [Taussig M. Defacement: public secrecy and the labor of the negative. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press; 1999. p. 2] together with his related concept of analysis as defacement. These ideas are combined with prior research which suggests that government auditors express audit findings with care so as to work within prevailing discourses. The auditors’ approach can at once be seen as pragmatic, in aiming to affect whatever change or improvement is possible, and limiting, in that they are constrained both by themselves and others from making observations that may be publicly unpalatable. While other work uncovers this approach in general, this paper explores the consequences of auditors in effect maintaining public secrets, using the findings of a performance audit of the Cleveland (Ohio) City Public Schools as an exemplar.