Abstract
This issue features five articles by authors located in Australia, France, Germany, Romania, the United Kingdom and the United States of America hereby continuing the journal’s international reach and relevance. The issue also contains a number of book reviews and a Call for Papers for a Special Issue of the journal on the theme ‘Histories of Accounting in Educational Institutions’ being guest edited by Laura Maran and Brian West. Brian stepped down from the role as Joint Editor of Accounting History on 31 December 2016 (see announcement in Vol. 21, No. 4, p. 388) and, from 1 January 2017, he has been a member of the Editorial Advisory Panel.
Miley and Read examine the role of accounting in British disablement pensions that were awarded to soldiers who sustained ‘shell shock’ arising from their Army service during the First World War. The study shows how this condition was effectively treated as an invisible medical condition in comparison with what were perceived as obvious war-inflicted medical conditions in the form of physical disabilities. The authors point to accounting’s ongoing role in illness classification and management systems and suggest that this historical example, rather than being potentially seen as an anachronism, may assist in better understanding the present day roles and impacts of accounting in the health-care sector.
The dichotomy of traditional accounting history and new accounting history is revisited by Tyson and Oldroyd in the context of a greater debate between postmodern and traditional historians. The authors respond to the contribution by Gaffikin (2011) entitled ‘What is (accounting) history?’, which appears in Volume 16, Number 3 of this journal and provide an overview of earlier articles, written by either or both of them, as contributions to the debate. An assessment of the current state of accounting historiography is also provided. Further contributions on the state and direction of accounting historiography are welcomed by Accounting History in an era where accounting is recognised as both technical practice and social practice.
Dattin explores the mandatory rotation of auditors in France, a practice which was introduced in 2003 under the Financial Safety Act that provided for the mandatory rotation of auditors every six years. Notwithstanding this development, shareholders could still appoint the same audit firm provided a different audit partner was engaged. In exploring this topic and considering the later introduced European Commission developments in respect to audit firms, the author provides the background to the emergence of statutory auditing and the notion of joint audit in France. More generally, the question of whether the mandatory rotation of auditors enhances the independence of auditors is considered.
An historical perspective is provided by Brandau, Endenich, Luther and Trapp on the relationship between German management accounting and financial accounting. Their study traces how financial accounting in Germany has been shaped by the country’s economic context and by legislation and how financial accounting, combined with institutional pressures, has, in turn, influenced management accounting in Germany. The authors, located in France, Germany and the United Kingdom, apply the Hegelian dialectic to examine the development of German accounting. With the introduction of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), a call is made to ascertain whether and how the adoption of these standards has impacted managerial accounting beyond Germany.
Finally, in this issue, the investigation by Deaconu and Filip juxtaposes the economic history of the Principality of Transylvania and the development of accounting thought and practice in the Principality and draws comparisons of accounting development in Transylvania with the general European context. The authors use periodisation and examine accounting emergence and change in Transylvania in four successive stages from the restoration of the Principality in 1541 until 1918. A lag is identified in developments in Transylvania compared with the general development of accounting in Europe, with this gap becoming narrower towards the end of the First World War.