La responsabilité contractuelle à l'hôpital: Un modèle fonctionnel malgré tout?

In this article, we investigate the formal accountability model that is now being put into practice in French hospitals, the model of managerial accountability. We adopt a critical perspective, both ideologically and technically, on the implementation in a public hospital of a new management and measurement system of the departments' performance, based on contracts. This allows us firstly to empirically illustrate the difficulties of implementing such a system. Secondly, we show how in practice such a system was put in place in a "softened" way that finally proved to be relevant for the organization, subject to certain conditions.