The development of industrial accounting in Britain and France before 1880: a comparative study of accounting literature and practice1

This paper sets out to examine the development, in Britain and France prior to 1880, of industrial accounting, defined for the purposes of this paper as the practice of cost calculation within an accounting system based on double entry bookkeeping. Similarities and differences between the two countries in regard to the development of an appropriate accounting literature and accounting practice are identified, and various explanations for the findings are explored. A close link is found to exist between the timing of the process of industrialization and the development of industrial accounting in each country, but it is suggested that economic factors alone do not provide a full explanation for the similarities and differences observed.     

Accrual accounting does not necessarily mean accrual accounting: Factors that counteract compliance with accounting standards in Swedish municipal accounting

The regulation of Swedish municipal accounting has undergone fundamental changes over recent decades. Municipal accounting became regulated by law the 1st of January, 1998 after having been merely voluntarily regulated in the past. In accordance with the legislation, a standard-setting body was formed, with responsibility for development and interpretation of generally accepted accounting principles for municipal accounting. Important aims of the legislation and reform were to suppress ‘creative’ accounting and to increase the level of harmonization and comparability. Using the lens of positive accounting theory as well as institutional theory, this paper describes and explains the impact of the legislation and standard setting in the Swedish municipal sector. We have used a triangulation approach, collecting data through a survey, documentary study and interviews. The overall results show that the reform has had a very limited impact on accounting practice. Compliance with accounting standards was in general poor. This result is in line with the assumptions of positive accounting theory. However, the study also shows that there are differences among the preparers which can be explained by institutional theory. Large municipalities produce better accounting information (i.e. more in line with generally accepted accounting principles) than the municipalities in general. Weak audit quality seems to be another important factor that explains the poor compliance with accounting standards.     

管理会计的射程与边界

管理会计的射程与边界即管理会计学科研究的范围。射程问题是由管理会计功能引发的发展问题。边界问题主要是由学科之间的关系引发的联系问题,可从横向和纵向两个角度考察。横向边界研究涉及管理会计学与会计学内部各学科及其与管理学、经济学之间的关系。纵向边界研究包含管理会计学科理论层面的扩展,以及基于供应链的管理会计发展。本文指出：随着管理会计工具的不断创新与整合,管理会计的发展已经进入了“价值创造的管理会计”阶段,具有“经济计算和信号传递”以及“生产、技术导向和组织结构”两种系列功能。应该通过研究管理会计学科的内外部关系,来有效规范和控制管理会计的边界,同时要针对经营控制逆反性,寻求平衡与发展。     

渐进发展中的会计法治化研究

会计法治化的艰难历程，既是适应经济发展要求，探求会计与财务、财政、经济相互促进、协调发展的过程，也是逐步总结会计发展经验教训、认识会计规律、统一会计理念、确立会计规范的过程。在不断的探索和创新中，我国的会计立法走过了20多年的风雨历程，对于指导我国的会计事业的发展起到了重要的保障作用，但在诸多方面也存在着严重不足。本文将在回顾我国会计立法基本历程，反思当前立法缺陷的基础上，把握今后会计立法工作的基本走向。     

Implementation of an integrated accounting and cost management system using the SAP system: a field study

Not only are in-depth (theoretically informed) longitudinal (reflexive) field studies few and far between, it has been argued in those studies that little is known about the design and implementation of accounting and information systems that operate in today's world-class organizations. Using such an approach this study seeks to illustrate and analyse the implementation processes of an integrated accounting and cost management system using the SAP system at a major steel producer in Australia. It is demonstrated that the technical design of the system is only a part of the implementation process. Keeping 'actor-networks' in line and managing change including behavioural implications on the implementation are also seen as crucial issues, which are outcomes of a continuous translation process.     

Inertia in the attributional content of annual accounting narratives

Narrative disclosures in annual reports reflect explanatory activities in which specific attribution patterns can be identified. Research on corporate attributional behaviour within the context of financial accounting narratives has documented this behaviour and evidenced significant preferences for certain kinds of explanations in particular circumstances. This kind of research typically relies on cross-sectional data. There exist few statistically validated conclusions regarding the character and consequences of such verbal behaviour over time. This paper reports on a study investigating the change in narrative explanation practices over time. In this longitudinal research special attention is given to the relative strength of consistency and inertial forces on the attributional behaviour in annual reports. It is argued that there are a variety of forces that make that the explanatory patterns in annual reports are likely to be very similar year after year. Reporting practices can be to a great extent unadaptive, in the sense that they become programmed through the development of habit, precedents, traditions and formalized procedures. This is not to say that reporting practices do not change, but that changes even in the way corporate outcomes and actions are explained, are expected to be modest. The purpose of the research was to determine the extent to which the attributional content and framing in annual narrative reports changed over a period of eight years, and whether these changes were related to certain organizational characteristics of the reporting companies conceptualized as potential sources of inertial forces. Overall the results confirm a significant degree of consistency in the attributional content of accounting narratives over time. Evidence of an inertial effect of company listing status and performance history was convincingly present as to the assertiveness aspects of attributional behaviour and as to the differential use of accounting language in the explanation of financial accounting outcomes.     

环境管理会计理论与实务问题分析

环境管理会计作为管理会计创新的组成部分,其理论研究和实务在过去十年里得到迅速发展．本文对国际上解决常规管理会计中有关问题的EMA理论研究和实务现状进行了分析,回顾了国际上有关行业的EMA 案例,分析了其存在问题,探讨了环境管理会计在投资评估、成本计算以及绩效管理等方面的进一步工作．     

Evaluating the statistical significance of de facto accounting harmonization: a study of European global players

Two different forces are involved in the international harmonization of accounting: institutional endeavours to harmonize accounting internationally by developing common accounting rules and reporting standards, and spontaneous efforts by ‘global players’ to adopt accounting methods that will improve communication with users in other countries. These two developments are proceeding side by side, generally reinforcing one another but occasionally moving independently. This paper is primarily concerned with the process of harmonization of financial accounting within the European Union. The hypothesis we want to test is that, in spite of the obstacles to the harmonization of regulations in the European Union, there has been greater conformity in recent years in the accounting practices of companies which operate on the international stage. If so, the implications for the harmonization strategies of the international bodies are important. In this study, we first carry out a critical analysis of previous research on accounting harmonization, summarizing the methods used in empirical studies of de facto harmonization and the results obtained. We note that the major deficiency in the index-based methods of measuring harmonization is that no test of significance has been included in prior research. In this paper, we propose a bootstrapping test of the C index as a way of measuring the significance of the change in its value. We consider a sample of eighty-five ‘global players’ from thirteen countries and we analyse their financial statements with regard to four accounting issues (deferred taxation, goodwill, leasing and foreign currency translation), providing estimates of the significance of de facto accounting harmonization for the periods from 1991–2 to 1996–7.     

Environmental accounting: an essential component of business strategy

Environmental accounting is on an expansion path. With increasing social focus on the environment, accounting fills an expectation role, to measure environmental performance. The status of environmental awareness provides a dynamic for business reporting its environmental performance. Examining the integration of environmental policy with business policy is the focus of this research. The business firm's strategy includes responding to capital and operating costs of pollution control equipment. This is caused by increasing public concerns over environmental issues, and by a recent government‐led trend to incentive‐based regulation. This paper describes the environmental component of the business strategy, producing the required performance reports and recognizing the multiple skills required to measure, compile and analyze the requisite data. Special emphasis of the research is on generation of reports and their standards, for the range of business and regulatory purposes. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Developing accounting and audit in a transition economy: the Romanian experience

The new Romanian accounting and auditing laws took effect in 1999. This paper investigates and evaluates the phase of development which started in 1996, comparing the outcome of that development with the experience of some other transition economies. Recognizing that the move to the market economy was a primary driver of change, the paper considers the economic and social context of Romania and the potential conflicts arising where the growing importance of the global market, political and international developments influence the shaping of strategy in matters of accounting. A strategy shaped in this way must also cater for the specific needs of the many small companies in transition economies. Key to the reform process in Romania has been the recognition that a controlled phasing-in of change, accompanied by training, is necessary to give the reform process a chance to succeed; however, this leads to tensions arising between professional associations, which wish to become self-regulatory, and governments, who need to retain a measure of control to ensure that all elements of the reform are in harmony. The paper concludes that the accounting developments from 1996 avoided some of the pitfalls experienced earlier in other transition economies and also shortened some of the development process by making changes in parallel rather than in sequence.     

投资者异质性与会计盈余信息的市场反应

本文借鉴经济学和心理学最新研究成果，从信息使用者的角度，分析具有前景理论和心理账户理论描述特徵的异质投资者的非理性行为，封会计盈余信息所蕴含价值的市场反应的影响：研究发现，具有前景理论和心理账户理论描述特徵的异质投资者，会倾向于继续持有亏损的股票，并卖出赢利的股票。在这种情况下，股票价格对于新增会计盈余信息的变化，会受到投资者心理账户申对于自身所持股票赢利或亏损分类的影响，造成以股票价格变化来衡量的会计盈余信息价值含量降低。本文的研究成功地把投资者心理因素与行为偏差的影响引入会计研究领域中，为後续研究提供了新思路.     

Reforming the reform: changing roles for accounting and management in the Italian health care sector

This paper examines the ways in which accounting has intervened in the process of reforming the original ‘reform’ of the Italian health care system. By stepping into an ongoing process accounting has been asked not only to foster efficiency, effectiveness and value for money, but to correct as well the ‘degeneration’ of the original reform, which subjected health care delivery to ‘democratic’ scrutiny and political control. The call for a greater accountability in the use of public resources has been thus interpreted as both a mechanism of surveillance and control and a way to resist the ‘over-politicization’ of health sector management together with the abuses, scandals and fraudulent behaviour it induced. In seeking to interpret the specificity of the Italian experience, the paper suggests that the range of ‘the contexts in which accounting operates’ should be broadened in order to gain a deeper understanding of its roles in those institutions, such as health care systems, which play a crucial role in modern societies. In order to move in this direction systematic and empirically grounded cross-national comparisons are called for, since, although accounting and management are involved in virtually all attempts to redesign health care services, consequences are likely to be different when conditions of possibility differ at the outset.     

文本中的会计变量及属性分析

会计文本是会计变量的集成,研究文本中的会计变量特性及其属性有助于对会计变量的设置及属性的说明。探讨会计变量及其属性,以说明不同会计变量及其属性特征描述的合理性,反映不同变量的信息含量。     

A profile of European accounting research: evidence from leading research journals

This paper attempts both to advance understanding about the research profile of accounting in Europe and to evaluate the role of The European Accounting Review in the dissemination of Europe-based accounting research. Empirical evidence supporting this investigation was gathered from all the papers published in thirteen top accounting journals during the period 1992 to 1997. Our results show that (i) a vast majority of European contributions to well-regarded journals are authored by scholars affiliated to British higher education organizations. Therefore, the overwhelming dominance of British accounting academics over Europe-based accounting research posits considerable doubts on the extent to which it is correct to form the notion of European accounting research. Our results suggest that such a notion is strongly shaped by one constituency of the European setting, that is, by researchers affiliated to British higher education institutions. (ii) The European Accounting Review has played a significant role in the diffusion of Europe-based accounting research. The journal constitutes the sole venue providing international visibility to scholars of eleven continental European countries. Moreover, The European Accounting Review has published a significant proportion of contributions from scholars of the other fifteen European countries. (iii) There exists limited mobility of non-English written accounting research across European countries. Lastly, the paper posits some suggestions for further work in this area.     

高校教育成本核算影响因素探析

高校教育成本核算既是满足高等教育不同投资主体对投资回报的客观需要,也是合理建立高等教育成本分担机制的必然选择,但因各种因素的制约,我国目前高校教育成本核算工作尚未有效的开展。本文在阐述教育成本相关理论及框架结构的基础上,从高校自身认识、宏观制度和微观技术性等方面,对影响高校教育成本核算的因素进行了分析,并提出了高校教育成本核算的措施。     

Capital assets in governmental accounting reforms: comparing Flemish technical issues with international standards

Although some efforts have been made over the last twenty years, governmental capital assets are still the subject of many unresolved questions. This paper first presents an overview of the current differing accounting standards or research efforts with respect to governmental capital assets and then analyses the criteria of recognition, valuation and disclosure of capital assets in the reform of three kinds of Flemish governments. Their reformed accounting system is compared with IPSAS 17 (IFAC), which is an important internationally driven milestone in respect of capital assets. There appears to be a lack of a conceptual framework regarding capital assets and an attempt is made to structure the existing ideas. Another important issue in governmental accounting is drawing up the ‘first balance sheet’, which is necessary when accounting reforms are implemented. This study indicates that the fact that no separate accounting framework for capital assets with respect to the first balance sheet is distinguished, causes a lot of confusion in the discussion about accounting standards. Finally, the paper aims to provide actual cases as illustrations in analysing governmental accounting standards for capital assets. The examination of the adoption of the governmental accounting reforms, reveals that such reforms do not usually take the specific governmental characteristics of capital assets into account.     

The role of accrual accounting in restricting dividends to shareholders

This paper addresses the question why net earnings and other accrual accounting numbers are frequently used to restrict dividends to shareholders. Even though this role of accrual accounting is widely accepted in the literature, a theory explaining the role of accruals in dividend restrictions is still in its early stages. Building on the principal–agent framework, I argue that basic features of the accrual process can be viewed as arising from the demand for dividend restrictions mitigating debt-related incentive problems. This explanation is consistent with the observation that, historically, debt contracting, dividend restrictions and the development of accrual accounting have been closely related. The basic idea is that the use of transactions and events in the accrual process leads to a contingent specification of the upper bound on dividends in an earnings-based constraint. Transactions and events used in the accrual process can be viewed as imperfect, but verifiable indicators for (unverifiable) determinants of debt-related incentive problems. This general idea is applied to incentive problems that regularly arise in a multi-period context. The paper demonstrates that the accrual process may mitigate distortions in shareholders' investment decisions using provisions and depreciation charges as examples.     

The development of models of accounting information systems in Sweden

Traditionally, accounting has evolved as a technique. Practitioners and academics have striven to improve the technical features of accounting. Now, accounting is conceived increasingly as an organizational artefact which interacts with other organizational practices in shaping organizational reality. Taking a broad perspective of management control, this paper aims at contributing to our knowledge of accounting in this second sense and identifying some Swedish contributions to the tool-box of accounting. In reviewing the development of models of accounting information in Sweden mainly since World War II, different factors explaining the evolution of each model are identified. Analyses of these factors reveal that different groups of actors have been engaged in the development of different parts of the accounting information system (AIS). It is also noted that the introduction of models that are widely applied has delayed the emergence of new models better adapted to the current situation in business. Comparisons will be made with the development in some other countries.     

浅谈管理会计信息的质量特征

管理会计是会计学的一个重要分支学科,是市场经济的产物。文章对管理会计信息的质量特征作了探讨,对其相关性、准确性、及时性、一贯性、客观性、灵活性、简明性和成本效益—平衡性作了阐述。