Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal最新文献

{"title":"Impression management at board meetings: accountability in public and in private","authors":"Helen R. Pernelet, N. Brennan","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-09-2022-6050","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-09-2022-6050","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeTo demonstrate transparency and accountability, the three boards in this study are required to meet in public in front of an audience, although the boards reserve confidential issues for discussion in private sessions. This study examines boardroom public accountability, contrasting it with accountability in board meetings held in private. The study adopts Erving Goffman's impression management theory to interpret divergences between boardroom behaviour in public and private, or “frontstage” and “backstage” in Goffman's terminology.Design/methodology/approachThe research observes and video-records three board meetings for each of the three boards (nine board meetings), in public and private. The research operationalises accountability in terms of director-manager question-and-answer interactions.FindingsIn the presence of an audience of local stakeholders, the boards employ impression management techniques to demonstrate accountability, by creating the impression that non-executive directors are performing challenge and managers are providing satisfactory answers. Thus, they “save the show” in Goffman terms. These techniques enable board members and managers to navigate the interface between demonstrating the required good governance and the competence of the organisations and their managers, while not revealing issues that could tarnish their image and concern the stakeholders. The boards need to demonstrate to the audience that “matters are what they appear to be”, even if they are not. The research identifies behaviour consistent with impression management to manage this complexity. The authors conclude that regulatory objectives have not met their transparency aspirations.Originality/valueFor the first time, the research studies the effect of transparency regulations (“sunshine” laws) on the behaviour of boards of directors meeting in public. The study contributes to the embryonic literature based on video-taped board meetings to access the “black box” of the boardroom, which permits a study of impression management at board meetings not previously possible. This study extends prior impression management theory by identifying eleven impression management techniques that non-executive directors and managers use and which are unique to a boardroom context.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-08-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115905242","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":"Navigating multiple accountabilities through managers’ boundary work in professional service firms","authors":"Ricardo Azambuja, Lisa Baudot, B. Malsch","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-08-2021-5407","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-08-2021-5407","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis study explores the professional work of managers in professional service firms (PSFs) by focusing on the relational position of managers as they interface between diverse groups of actors and navigate a multiplicity of accountabilities.Design/methodology/approachDrawing on an ethnographic study of managers in a Brazilian PSF, this study demonstrates through observations, interviews and shadowing how PSF managers address multiple accountabilities in the conduct of professional work.FindingsTo navigate multiple accountabilities, PSF managers perform several forms of boundary work, which the authors conceptualize as “revamping” and “remolding” operations and “translating” and “transforming” understandings. The form of boundary work performed depends on the configuration of two elements of accountability demands: knowledge orientation and extent of exposure. Although analytically distinct, these elements intertwine, suggesting the need for a dynamic perspective on accountability. The analysis shows that professional work extends beyond fixed or passive views of hierarchical and intrinsic accountability to emphasize that managers exude accountability of an adaptive nature.Research limitations/implicationsThis study illustrates and theorizes the role of boundary work in PSFs, develops its link to accountability, and identifies its scholarly and practical affordances and limitations for understanding managers’ professional work when navigating multiple accountabilities.Originality/valueThe findings reveal perspectives and behaviors of managers embedded in PSFs, illustrating their unstructured and agentic experiences of accountability and boundary work in practice. The insights can be extended to other contexts where managers face multiple accountabilities in conducting professional work.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"83 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-08-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122806659","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":"Accountability for responsibility: a case study of a more intelligent enactment of accountability","authors":"Grete Helle, John Roberts","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-07-2021-5369","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-07-2021-5369","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to explore how hierarchical accountability can be enacted and accounting control systems mobilized in a way that promotes a sense of felt responsibility.Design/methodology/approachThe paper draws on interviews, shadowing and observations to explore the implementation of a strategy for “increasing accountability” in a Norwegian Oil Company. The case provided an opportunity to explore the dynamics of hierarchical accountability and felt responsibility, and in particular Roberts (2009) concept of “intelligent accountability”, in an empirical context.FindingsThe case study explores how the strategy of increasing accountability at OilCo was enacted around three operational issues; the control of costs, roles and relationships in the complex matrix structure, and the operation of the management system. It traces how the long history of Beyond Budgeting practices and philosophy in OilCo resulted both in an explicit recognition of the incompleteness of accounting numbers, and trust-based practices which avoided many of the dysfunctional individual and organizational effects typically associated with the exercise of hierarchical control.Originality/valueThe paper explores empirically how OilCo’s embrace of Beyond Budgeting practices and philosophy had created the conditions under which a more intelligent form of accountability could emerge. As a European case study, it calls into question the Anglo-American tradition of accounting research which suggests that externally imposed accountability within a hierarchy mitigates against employees’ felt responsibility.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"143 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-08-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124239693","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 to promote ethical tolerance: the case of the Italian prostitution model (1860)","authors":"Marco Gatti, Simone Poli","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-08-2022-5956","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-08-2022-5956","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis paper explores the role that the control system – understood as a set of financial and non-financial mechanisms – introduced by the Ministerial Decree of 15th February 1860 played in promoting the ethical tolerance of prostitution in the Kingdom of Italy.Design/methodology/approachA qualitative research method was adopted. Specifically, this study draws on literature on accounting and deviant behaviors and on Suchman's theories of legitimation (1995) to interpret empirical evidence collected from archival primary sources as well as secondary sources.FindingsThe paper highlights how the accounting mechanisms introduced by the law were molded to limit the serious consequences of prostitution from a public health standpoint and to demonstrate that the State neither profited from prostitution nor used public money to fund it. This should have stimulated ethical tolerance of the law itself and, consequently, of the prostitution that was regulated.Originality/valueThis paper opens a new research avenue in the field of accounting history by exploring the connection between accounting and prostitution. Moreover, unlike the extant literature on accounting and deviant behaviors, this study delves into the role played by accounting mechanisms to promote ethical tolerance rather than to activate normalization processes.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"5 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-08-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"126816949","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":"Introduction to special issue on ethnographies of accountability","authors":"C. Cordery, Ivo De Loo, H. Letiche","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-07-2023-6546","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-07-2023-6546","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis paper aims to outline the motivation for this Accounting, Auditing and Accountability Journal (AAAJ) Special Issue, providing an overview of the six selected papers. This study seeks to inspire further ethnographic research on accountability.Design/methodology/approachThe authors reflect on why ethnographic investigation is essential to accountability research and the boundaries that constrained and enabled both this Special Issue and which occur in ethnographic research.FindingsThe contents of this issue do not merely describe or analyse one or more “accounts”, but also consider how the accounted for reflects its surroundings and its role in the social world. The authors argue that such research should progress from ethnographic descriptive data to infer meaningful conclusions and move from the everyday natural settings of behaviour to examine inter-relatedness. This requires the researcher to maintain their intra-relatedness. These boundaries, inherent to human existence, are actively created and operate at different aggregation levels to include and exclude.Research limitations/implicationsIn this introduction and the papers selected for this AAAJ special issue, with few exceptions, accountability shifts from the researched to the researcher as research accounts are produced. Yet, ethnographies of accountability are epistemologically and ontologically weighted towards accepting the possibility of shared social meaning requiring researchers to manage the interactions, relationalities and presuppositions between these places. The authors urge future researchers to experiment more explicitly than has often been the case with published accounts of these demands.Originality/valueThis AAAJ Special Issue provides a set of original empirical and theoretical contributions to support and advance further ethnographic research into accountability which acknowledges the boundaries that may include and exclude.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"1 4 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-08-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121138508","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":"Auditing the auditors: a performative “spectacle” of public oversight","authors":"Peter Ghattas, T. Soobaroyen, Shahzad Uddin, Oliver Marnet","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-08-2022-5957","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-08-2022-5957","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis paper analyses the establishment and evolution of a public oversight body (POB) – the Egyptian Audit Oversight Unit (AOU) – and its implications for local auditing firms and practices.Design/methodology/approachPrimary data were gathered from 34 semi-structured interviews (including follow-up ones) between 2014 and 2020. Secondary data was obtained through publicly available documents and internal memos. Drawing on Debord's (1967) Society of the Spectacle, the insights focus on the POB's conception, materialisation and evolution in a context characterised by weak regulatory structures.FindingsThrough a series of acts, the findings reveal how the AOU first accepted the image of “international best practice” oversight (the “metaphorical”), followed by the construction of the local structure and décor replicating a United States (US) style POB archetype (the “transformational”) by primarily relying on visible processes/procedures. Yet, these mechanisms emphasised the spectacular nature of oversight, with little improvement for practice and limiting itself to “cracking down” on smaller local firms. A final stage (the “performative”) reveals how the AOU seeks to expand its activities beyond its original mandate without challenging the image-driven nature of its oversight.Originality/valueThe paper offers two key contributions. First, it reveals how actors, through a combination of symbolic and tangible measures, create a new performative reality of public oversight. Second, it advocates Debord's “spectacle” to complement other theoretical lenses, with a view to illuminating the materialisation stages that bridge the gap between proclaimed oversight policies and actual practices (including conscious and unconscious omissions) within a given political economy context.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"22 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-07-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130725683","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":"To boldly go where no one has gone before: a critical realist approach to space accounting","authors":"Sven Modell","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-09-2022-6044","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-09-2022-6044","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how critical realism can be mobilised as a meta-theory, or philosophical under-labourer, for research on space accounting and how this may further inquiries into the known as well as the unknown implications of space exploration and commercialisation.Design/methodology/approachThis is a conceptual paper that applies critical realism to the field of space accounting using cost management in space contracts as an illustrative example.FindingsAdopting a naturalised version of critical realism that recognises the complex interplay between natural and social realities, the author nuances the distinction between intransitive and transitive objects of knowledge and advances a framework that may be used as a starting point for a transfactual mode of reasoning. The author then applies this mode of reasoning to the topic of cost management in the space sector and illustrates how it may enhance our insights into what causes cost overruns in space contracts.Research limitations/implicationsBy adopting a naturalised version of critical realism, the author establishes a philosophical framework that can support the broadly based, inter-disciplinary research agenda that has been envisaged for research on space accounting and possibly inform policy development.Originality/valueThis paper is the first to apply a critical realist perspective to space accounting and lays a philosophical foundation for future research on the topic.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116842472","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":"Counter-conducting environmental injustices and (un)accountability: Ken Saro-Wiwa’s accounts of the Ogoni’s struggle for emancipation","authors":"S. Lauwo, Osamuyimen Egbon, Mercy Denedo, A. Ejiogu","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-06-2022-5878","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-06-2022-5878","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis paper explores the historical roots of environmental accountability in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria by focusing on the campaigns for social and environmental justice by writer Ken Saro-Wiwa and the indigenous Ogoni people.Design/methodology/approachThe methods consist of an analysis of books, diaries, letters and poems written by Ken Saro-Wiwa as well as books, reports and audio recordings of panel discussions which capture the Ogoni struggle, Ken Saro-Wiwa’s activism and its impacts. The authors’ approach to the data is sensitised by Foucault’s notion of counter-conduct as it enables the authors to better grasp the creative agency of Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni as they struggle and campaign for political autonomy, environmental justice and accountability.FindingsThe authors’ findings illustrate how Ken Saro-Wiwa’s books, letters, poems, diaries and articles provide early accounts of environmental injustices and the absence of accountability in the Niger Delta. They highlight how Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni movement deploy counter-conduct to subvert existing power and accountability structures through innovative strategies, effective mobilisation and communication at local and international levels. The authors’ findings also highlight how these have led to specific forms of accountability for human rights and the environment at local and global levels. They also show how Saro-Wiwa’s activism and the Ogoni struggle have inspired a new generation of environmental activists and new ways of demanding accountability.Originality/valueThis paper presents, for the first time, an account of the historical roots of environmental accountability practices from an African and developing country context. Its focus on the historical roots of environmental accountability is also unique as it expands the view beyond the origins of environmental accounting to look more broadly at the origins of environmental accountability practices.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"15 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-07-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127279514","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":"Safeguarding the unknown: performance measurement, academic agency and the meaning of research quality in practice","authors":"D. Bedford, M. Granlund, K. Lukka","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-08-2022-5986","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-08-2022-5986","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe authors examine how performance measurement systems (PMSs) and academic agency influence the meaning of research quality in practice. The worries are that the notion of research quality is becoming too simplistically and narrowly determined by research quality's measurable proxies and that academics, especially manager-academics, do not sufficiently realise this risk. Whilst prior literature has covered the effects of performance measurement in the university sector broadly and how PMSs are mobilised locally, there is only little understanding of whether and how PMSs affect the meaning of research quality in practice.Design/methodology/approachThe study is designed as a comparative case study of two university faculties in Finland. The role of conceptual analysis plays a notable role in the study, too.FindingsThe authors find that manager-academics of the two examined faculties have rather similar conceptual understandings of research quality. However, there were differences in the degree of slippage between the “espoused-meaning” of research quality and “meaning-in-practice” of research quality. The authors traced these differences to how the local PMS and manager-academics’ agency relate to one another within the context of increasing global and national performance pressures. The authors developed a tentative framework for the various “styles of agency”. This suggests how the relationship between the local PMS and manager-academics’ exerted agency shapes the “degrees of freedom” of the meaning of research quality in practice.Originality/valueGiven that research quality lies at the heart of academic work, the authors' paper indicates that exploring the three matters – performance measurement, the agency of manager-academics and the meaning of research quality in practice – in combination is crucial for the sustainability of the academe. The authors contribute to the literature by detailing the way in which local PMS and manager-academics' agency have material impacts on what research quality means in practice. The authors conclude by highlighting the pressing need for manager-academics to exercise the agency in efforts to safeguard a broad and pluralistic understanding of research quality in practice.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"19 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-07-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124793674","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 spread of sportswashing within top-flight football: a discussion of its underpinnings, mechanisms and probable consequences","authors":"R. Roslender","doi":"10.1108/aaaj-06-2022-5849","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-06-2022-5849","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe paper discusses a range of aspects of the spread of sportswashing within top-flight football, identifies the motivations of its proponents, what is on offer to football clubs, their followers and local communities and the ways in which it coheres with the nature of the modern game.Design/methodology/approachA range of disparate literature, both academic and non-academic, is synthesised to provide a broad-ranging introduction to the spread of sportswashing within top-flight football.FindingsSportswashing is likely to increase within top-flight football in future years as a result of its resonance with aspects of the game's evolving nature. Resistance to its continuing spread presently appears improbable.Originality/valueAs relatively recent development within football, the sportswashing topic has produced a limited literature to which this paper contributes.","PeriodicalId":132341,"journal":{"name":"Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal","volume":"66 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-07-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114710645","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}