This international comparative study of the Ombudsman institution began life in March 1994 when Philip Giddings and Roy Gregory formed the idea of producing a successor to Gerald Caiden's International Handbook of the Ombudsman (1983). In the decade and a half since Caiden's volume was produced, there has been a considerable expansion of the number and variety of Ombudsman institutions. With the generous assistance of the International Institute of Administrative Sciences (IIAS) we were able to assemble a team of experts, containing academics and practitioners, public lawyers, political...