Trust and Accounting Regulation: Towards an Interdisciplinary Research Agenda

Abstract

Based on understanding accounting as a social construct we aim to raise research questions in context of trust and accounting regulation. While not providing a comprehensive literature overview, we identify opportunities for research which we mainly see in understanding what trust in accounting constitutes. Regulation theory and issues surrounding the communication between organizations and stakeholders qualify for both theoretical and empirical research. In all contexts we fi nd application of interdisciplinary approaches to offer fruitful perspectives, not only within business economics but beyond. We argue that the proposed agenda has implications for practice and policy as it may inform companies as well as regulators on how to adequately deal with trust when reporting fi nancial information.