{"title":"New world, or out of this world? Columbus – an exploratory study of HASS and STEM success factors in the first “space” race","authors":"Richard M. Kerslake, C. Krishnamurti","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-11-2022-6164","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-11-2022-6164","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the extent to which interdisciplinary (HASS, i.e. non-STEM) factors—in particular, accounting, stakeholder management and accountability—enable, influence and motivate large human exploration ventures, principally in maritime and space fields, utilizing Columbus’s and Chinese explorations of the 1400s as the primary setting.Design/methodology/approachThe study analyzes archival data from narrative and interpretational history, including both academic and non-academic sources, that relate to two global historical events, the Columbus and Ming Chinese exploration eras (c. 1400–1500), as a parallel to the modern “Space Race”. Existing studies on pertinent HASS (Humanities and Social Sciences) and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) enablers, influencers and motivators are utilized in the analysis. The authors draw upon the concepts of stakeholder theory and the construct of accountability in their analysis.FindingsFindings suggest that non-STEM considerations—politics, finance, accountability, culture, theology and others—played crucial roles in enabling Western Europe (Columbus) to reach the Americas before China or other global powers, demonstrating the pivotal importance of HASS factors in human advancements and exploration.Research limitations/implicationsIn seeking to answer those questions, this study identifies only those factors (HASS or STEM) that may support the success or failure in execution of the exploration and development of a region such as the New World or Space. Moreover, the study has the following limitation. Relative successes, failures, drivers and enablers of exploratory ventures are drawn almost exclusively from the documented historical records of the nations, entities and individuals (China and Europe) who conducted those ventures. A paucity of objective sources in some fields, and the need to set appropriate boundaries for the study, also necessitate such limitation.Practical implicationsIt is observable that many of those HASS factors also appear to have been influencers in modern era Space projects. For Apollo and Soyuz, success factors such as the relative economics of USA and USSR, their political ideologies, accountabilities and organizational priorities have clear echoes. What the successful voyages of Columbus and Apollo also have in common is an appetite to take risks for an uncertain return, whether as sponsor or voyager; an understanding of financial management and benefits measurement, and a leadership (Isabella I, John F. Kennedy) possessing a vision, ideology and governmental apparatus to further the venture’s goals.Originality/valueWhilst various historical studies have examined influences behind the oceangoing explorations of the 1400s and the colonization of the “New World”, this article takes an original approach of analyzing those motivations and other factors collectively, in interdisciplinary terms (HASS and STEM). This approach als","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"43 7","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-01-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139450627","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The commodification of education: an academic dilemma","authors":"Tarek Rana","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-01-2024-215","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-01-2024-215","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"39 12","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-01-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139385031","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"AAAJ Literature and Insights Resist to exist in accounting","authors":"Juh Círico, Marli Auxiliadora da Silva","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-01-2024-214","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-01-2024-214","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"61 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-01-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139450569","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Umbrella protectors? Analysing valuing, hybridity and compromises for Chinese middle managers","authors":"Chao Ren, Hui Situ, Gillian Vesty","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-05-2022-5805","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-05-2022-5805","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis paper examines the ways in which Chinese university middle managers evaluate subordinate performance in response to the Chinese Double First-Class University Plan, a national project that ranks the performance of universities. In exploring compromise arrangements, the hybridised valuing activity of middle managers is found to be shaped by emergent and extant macro-foundations.Design/methodology/approachThe qualitative data from 49 semi-structured interviews at five Chinese public universities were conducted. Drawing on macro-foundational studies and the sociology of worth (SW) theory, the analysis helps to identify socially shared patterns of actions and outcomes.FindingsThe findings elucidate the interplay between diverse economic, social, political and institutional values and the compromise-making by middle managers. The authors find that contextual factors restrict Chinese academic middle managers' autonomy, preventing workable compromise. Through the selective adoption of international and local management practices, compromise has evolved into a private differential treaty at the operational level.Originality/valueA nuanced explanation reveals how the macro-foundations of Chinese society influence middle managers who engage with accounting when facilitating compromise. This study helps outsiders better understand the complex convergence and divergence of performance evaluative practices in Chinese universities against the backdrop of global market-based forces and the moral dimensions of organisational life. The findings have wider implications for the Chinese government in navigating institutional steps and developing supportive policies to enable middle managers to advance productive but also sustainable compromise.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"34 27","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-12-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138946900","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Anne K.H. Neal, Merridee L Bujaki, Sylvain Durocher, François Brouard
{"title":"Identity performances on professional accounting association magazine covers","authors":"Anne K.H. Neal, Merridee L Bujaki, Sylvain Durocher, François Brouard","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-09-2021-5459","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-09-2021-5459","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe authors examine and compare accounting associations' identities in distinct segments of the accounting profession surrounding the 2014 merger of three Canadian accounting associations.Design/methodology/approachThe authors conceive of accounting associations' magazine front covers as a setting for “identity performance” (i.e. a scenery through which identity dimensions are intentionally communicated to target audiences). The authors examine pre-merger and post-merger associations' identity performances that took place between January 2011 and December 2020 and identify 21 broad themes that the authors interpret in terms of identity logics (i.e. professionalism/commercialism) and audience focus (society/association members), underscoring (dis)similarities in identity performances pre- and post-merger.FindingsThe authors' analysis reveals distinct identity performances for the different segments of the pre-merger accounting profession and for the post-merger unified accounting association. Identity logics manifest differently: a commercial logic dominated for two of the associations and a professional logic dominated for the third. Identity fluidity was evident in the merged association's shift from commercial toward professional logic when the association ceased publishing one magazine and introduced a new one. Society rather than associations' members dominated as a target audience for all associations, but this focus manifested differently. Post-merger, identity performances continued to focus on society as the audience.Originality/valueThe authors highlight the Goffmanian identity performances (Goffman, 1959) taking place via accounting associations' magazines. The authors adopt a segment perspective (Bucher and Strauss, 1961) that demonstrates that commercialism does not trump professionalism in all segments of the profession. For the first time, the authors juxtapose identity logics (professionalism/commercialism) and targeted audiences to better understand how these facets of accountants' identities compare between segments.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"9 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132719960","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The significance of football in an urban mosaic","authors":"I. Lapsley","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-05-2022-5799","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-05-2022-5799","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis study aims to add to the understanding of the significance of football in cities, where most major football clubs are located. Specifically, this study offers a distinctive perspective on what might be regarded as “football cities” by the study's mobilisation of theories of the urban mosaic, the calculable city and identity. This study contributes to the emergent field of popular culture (Jeacle, 2012) and, within this field of popular culture, the significance of soccer. The particular setting of this study is the city. This paper is a contribution to the established accounting literature on city studies but within the neglected study of football in cities.Design/methodology/approachThis paper's focus is on the significance of football clubs in one city. The theoretical approach adopted is a blending of studies of the urban mosaic (Timms, 1975), the calculable city (Lapsley et al., 2010) and the established trend of identification studies in accounting. This investigation was undertaken in the city of Edinburgh by observation of football in city life. This research is a form of participant observation in which the author lived in the city in this study. The researcher undertook interviews with key actors in both football clubs and city management, made use of local media and scrutinised publicly available documents on both the clubs and the city administrations.FindingsThis research reveals the importance of the city mosaic in explaining the limited significance of football in this city. This approach underlines the merits of contextual studies. However, the evidence presented also reveals the presence of strong identity relationships between football clubs and the clubs' fans. These results reveal an internal perspective on city management and the activities of football clubs and the clubs' host city. The presence of multiple football clubs in a single city offers more diffuse identity relationships, with football clubs fostering stronger identification with the club than with the city. There is also evidence of single, dual and multiple identity relationships in this study which contrasts with the single identity perspectives of prior accounting research.Research limitations/implicationsThe focus of this paper is on the research question posed in the Call for Papers - Is there a Soccer Society? The findings of this study offer only limited evidence of a soccer society.Practical implicationsThere is a need to study other cities with football clubs to determine those which are mosaics and those which are dominated by football.Social implicationsThis a study which embraces the importance of social context in finding meaning in accounting research. This paper introduces the novel concept of the city mosaic which is a novel way of understanding different city contexts.Originality/valuePrior research on football has examined fans' behaviour, financial crises at football clubs and governance structures. This paper extends these earlier an","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"104 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124043422","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Christopher Chapman, Asako Kimura, Norio Sawabe, Hiroyuki Selmes-Suzuki
{"title":"Preparing for serendipity: an illustrative analysis of participation in the field","authors":"Christopher Chapman, Asako Kimura, Norio Sawabe, Hiroyuki Selmes-Suzuki","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-06-2021-5312","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-06-2021-5312","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis paper aims to explore how researchers in general, and field researchers in particular, might respond to systems of governance of the researchers' activity in ways that can support rather than distort the quality of the research.Design/methodology/approachWe draw upon literature on serendipity to develop a framework for engaging with the positive and negative potentials of systems of governance. We ground our analysis in discussion of participation in the field comprising two parts: first, the examination of our own activities and second, the accounts of participation found in two career-autobiographical interviews with emeritus professors of management accounting from Japan.FindingsWe highlight the potential for a productive tension between two contrasting perspectives that researchers might take on governance of their activity. A contractual perspective sees the value of targets and detailed pre-planning. A reflexive perspective sees the value of exploring the unexpected and considering many alternatives. We offer a framework for considering serendipity and the conditions that facilitate serendipity to help researchers maintain a productive tension between these perspectives.Research limitations/implicationsWe build upon retrospective accounts of two successful individuals whose careers evolved in a specific context. The intention is not to set out what might be generally achievable in a research career, nor to propose specific lines of action or planning in relation to specific systems of governance, since these vary across countries and over time. Rather, the paper draws on these materials to illuminate the more general challenge of preparing for serendipity in a way that goes beyond simple opportunism.Originality/valueWe analyse how researchers' mindfulness of serendipity and the nature of contexts that facilitate serendipity can encourage a productive tension between contractual and reflexive perspectives on governance of academic activity.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"4 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122909414","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Jill Frances Atkins, Federica Doni, Karen McBride, Christopher Napier
{"title":"Exploring the historical roots of environmental and ecological accounting from the dawn of human consciousness","authors":"Jill Frances Atkins, Federica Doni, Karen McBride, Christopher Napier","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-03-2023-6354","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-03-2023-6354","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis paper seeks to broaden the agenda for environmental and ecological accounting research across several dimensions, extending the form of accounting in this field by encouraging research into its historical roots and developing a definition of accounting that can address the severe environmental and ecological challenges of the 21st century.Design/methodology/approachThe authors explored environmental and ecological accounts from the dawn of human consciousness across a wide variety of media and in a broad range of forms. This theoretical approach reacts to the cold capitalist commodification of nature inherent in much environmental accounting practice, which documents, values and records usage of natural capital with little attempt to address depletion and loss.FindingsBy analysing the earliest ecological and environmental “accounts” recorded by humans at the dawn of human consciousness, and considering a wide array of subsequent accounts, the authors demonstrate that rather than being a secondary, relatively recent development emerging from financial accounting and reporting, environmental and ecological accounting predated financial accounting by tens of thousands of years. This research also provides a wealth of perspectives on diversity, not only in forms of account but also in the diversity of accountants, as well as the broadness of the stakeholders to whom and to which the accounts are rendered.Research limitations/implicationsThe paper can be placed at the intersection of accounting history, the alternative, interdisciplinary and critical accounts literature, and environmental and ecological accounting research.Practical implicationsPractically, the authors can draw ideas and inspiration from the historical forms and content of ecological and environmental account that can inform new forms of and approaches to accounting.Social implicationsThere are social implications including the diversity of accounts and accountants derived from studying historical ecological and environmental accounts from the dawn of human consciousness especially in the broadening out of the authors' understanding of the origins and cultural roots of accounting.Originality/valueThis study concludes with a new definition of accounting, fit for purpose in the 21st century, that integrates ecological, environmental concerns and is emancipatory, aiming to restore nature, revive biodiversity, conserve species and enhance ecosystems.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"73 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124244722","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Accounting and racial violence in the postbellum American South","authors":"S. Walker","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-01-2023-6245","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-01-2023-6245","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe paper aims to explore the relationship between accounting and racial violence through an investigation of sharecropping in the postbellum American South.Design/methodology/approachA range of primary sources including peonage case files of the US Department of Justice and the archives of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) are utilised. Data are analysed by reference to Randall Collins' theory of violence. Consistent with this theory, a micro-sociological approach to examining violent encounters is employed.FindingsIt is demonstrated that the production of alternative or competing accounts, accounting manipulation and failure to account generated interactions where confrontational tension culminated in bluster, physical attacks and lynching. Such violence took place in the context of potent racial ideologies and institutions.Originality/valueThe paper is distinctive in its focus on the interface between accounting and “actual” (as opposed to symbolic) violence. It reveals how accounting processes and traces featured in the highly charged emotional fields from which physical violence could erupt. The study advances knowledge of the role of accounting in race relations from the late nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth century, a largely unexplored period in the accounting history literature. It also seeks to extend the research agenda on accounting and slavery (which has hitherto emphasised chattel slavery) to encompass the practice of debt peonage.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"38 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-08-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133691396","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Glen Finau, D. Jarvis, N. Stoeckl, S. Larson, D. Grainger, M. Douglas, Ewamian Aboriginal Corporation, Ryan Barrowei, Bessie Coleman, D. Groves, Joshua E. Hunter, Maria Lee, Michael Markham
{"title":"Accounting for Indigenous cultural connections to land: insights from two Indigenous groups of Australia","authors":"Glen Finau, D. Jarvis, N. Stoeckl, S. Larson, D. Grainger, M. Douglas, Ewamian Aboriginal Corporation, Ryan Barrowei, Bessie Coleman, D. Groves, Joshua E. Hunter, Maria Lee, Michael Markham","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-08-2022-5971","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-08-2022-5971","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis paper aims to present the findings of a government-initiated project that sought to explore the possibility of incorporating cultural connections to land within the federal national accounting system using the United Nations Systems of Environmental-Economic Accounting (UN-SEEA) framework as a basis.Design/methodology/approachAdopting a critical dialogic approach and responding to the calls for critical accountants to engage with stakeholders, the authors worked with two Indigenous groups of Australia to develop a system of accounts that incorporates their cultural connections to “Country”. The two groups were clans from the Mungguy Country in the Kakadu region of Northern Territory and the Ewamian Aboriginal Corporation of Northern Queensland. Conducting two-day workshops on separate occasions with both groups, the authors attempted to meld the Indigenous worldviews with the worldviews embodied within national accounting systems and the UN-SEEA framework.FindingsThe models developed highlight significant differences between the ontological foundations of Indigenous and Western-worldviews and the authors reflect on the tensions created between these competing worldviews. The authors also offer pragmatic solutions that could be implemented by the Indigenous Traditional Owners and the government in terms of developing such an accounting system that incorporates connections to Country.Originality/valueThe paper contributes to providing a contemporary case study of engagement with Indigenous peoples in the co-development of a system of accounting for and by Indigenous peoples; it also contributes to the ongoing debate on bridging the divide between critique and praxis; and finally, the paper delves into an area that is largely unexplored within accounting research which is national accounting.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"17 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-08-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114470209","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}