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The primary aim of this study is to examine the descriptive power of the private interest model of professional accounting ethics developed by Parker in 1994. This examination is undertaken over an extended time period in the Irish context. It develops prior research which concluded that the operation of the professional ethics machinery of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland (CAI) facilitated private interest motives on the part of the ICAI. The paper draws on evidence regarding three critical events occurring outside the disciplinary process of the ICAI but impacting directly on its operation as well as on perceptions from within the process. The discourse surrounding the disciplinary process from 1994 to 2001 is examined using media coverage and ICAI pronouncements. This is augmented with in‐depth interviews held with members of the ICAI disciplinary committees. The analysis provides evidence of pockets of support for the descriptive power of Parker’s model but also illustrates how the rigid and static nature of the separate roles depicted within the model can often fail to capture the complexity of the various changes occurring over the period examined. The study presents evidence which challenges the proposed interrelationships between the various private interest roles depicted in the model and makes some suggestions for the modification of the model, particularly the interrelationships depicted therein.

Over recent years, public relations (PR) research has diversified in themes and theories. As a result, PR presents itself today as a multi-paradigmatic discipline with competing ideas of progress that mainly circle around questions of ontology and epistemology, i.e. around defining appropriate object and knowledge in PR research.

This conceptual article highlights a third crucial question underlying the debate drawing on a narrative approach: The question of axiology, hence, the normative question how PR research shall develop to contribute to societal progress.

The article presents a model, which describes how normative visions of progress in different PR paradigms – functional, co-creational, social-reflective and critical-cultural – manifest in each distinct combinations of four narrative plots – tragedy, romance, comedy and satire.

These findings complement the current debate on disciplinary progress in PR research by fostering reflection and debate on paradigm development and cross-paradigmatic tensions and exchange from an explicit axiological perspective.

This paper is an empirical response to two of Quattrone’s claims: first, that research in accounting is fragmented; and then that this follows from the blocking of communication by intra‐ and inter‐disciplinary boundaries. Although we agree with much of Quattrone’s argument, and in particular with his problematising of “economic man”, we draw an opposite conclusion. Rather than looking to a trans‐disciplinary removal of boundaries, we use a survey of 30 years of research in corporate annual reports to defend narrowly disciplinary work. We make our case through discussing problems of intra‐ and inter‐disciplinary unity in research, the puzzle of the role of “economic man” in the study of annual reports, and the alternative to him in science and technology studies (STS). Our approach yields a better fit than Quattrone’s own solution with his aims of an evolutionary perspective that allows for historical shifts, and for a reflexivity that includes the inevitable entanglement of researchers in what they study. We conclude by noting that our approach is applicable to the study of corporate communication more generally.

This paper seeks to gain an insight into the behavior of a large NHS trust, in its attempt to meet a 90 percent patient access target, in a week long national audit in March 2003. Why did individuals act in dramatically different ways to their norm over this period? The work of Michel Foucault is used to explore these issues. The discourses of power, knowledge, discipline and governmentality are identified as key foucaudian themes that offer an alternative interpretation of how individuals behave in their place of work. The importance of the historical context of discourse within the NHS cannot be underestimated in shaping the behavior of individuals and groups today. Power and knowledge permeate NHS organizations through disciplinary practices and dressage. Governmentality seeks to maintain the status quo through disciplinary processes such as national healthcare targets. The natural response of NHS organizations is therefore, to seek order and conformity rather than disorder and conflict.

How the concept of organisational culture was applied to a recent study of academic organisations in an Australian university is the thrust of this article. Rather than use the more traditional approach of analysing functions and formal structures, the study added a different perspective by applying a cultural framework adapted chiefly from the works of three noted scholars of higher education. It examined academic culture, namely, the symbolic dimension of academic organisation embodying the traditions, myths, rituals, occupational beliefs and values and other forms of expressive symbolism that have grown up about universities and the life and work of academics. Different levels of culture are revealed, bases of conflict and aspects of a common culture are elucidated, their organisational implications are discussed and the value of a cultural perspective is addressed.

This paper aims to explore the characteristics of knowledge diffusion in library and information science (LIS) to reveal the impact of knowledge in LIS on other disciplines and the disciplinary status of LIS.

Taking the 573 highly cited papers (HCP) of LIS during the years 2000–2019 in Web of Science and 85,638 papers citing them from non-LIS disciplines as the analysis object, this paper analysed the disciplines to which the citing papers belonged regarding the Biglan model, and the topics and their characteristics of the citing disciplines using latent Dirichlet allocation topic clustering.

The results showed that the knowledge in LIS was exported to multiple disciplines and topics. (1) Citations from other disciplines were overall increasing, and the main citing disciplines, mainly from applied science disciplines, were medicine, computer science, management, economics, education, sociology, psychology, journalism and communication, earth science, engineering, biology, political science, chemistry and agronomy. However, those disciplines had fewer citations to LIS during for the years from 2000 to 2004, with rapid growth in the next three time periods. (2) The citing papers had various topics and showed an increasing trend in quantity. Moreover, topics of different disciplines from 2000 to 2019 had various characteristics.

From the perspective of discipline and topic, this study analyses papers citing the HCP of LIS from non-LIS disciplines, revealing the impact of knowledge in LIS on other disciplines.

In this study, internal auditors are asked to come to a view on whether functions they perform in connection with internal audit engagements are essential, and to what degree. Inspired by Burns, Greenspan and Hartwell’s concept of the true professional, there is an underlying interest in determining whether, and under what circumstances, internal auditors’ enjoy the authority over and independence from management that we might expect of a professional. The findings emerge from a survey of New Zealand auditors, all of whom are IIA branch members. A 73 per cent response rate is achieved over the original and follow‐up survey. A factor analysis identifies converging issues, and t‐tests isolate responses by employment status, disciplinary background, experience, and audit charter existence. The findings suggest that characteristics of a “true” profession exist but do not dominate. Significantly, and as subgroups, public practice and experienced auditors may enjoy greater influence over management, and accountancy‐trained auditors may enjoy greater status owing to the “mystique” of their activities. Comments from the internal auditors shed further light on these results. Conclusions point to further avenues for research.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the performance of accounting researchers in winning competitive Australian Research Council (ARC) grants, when compared with researchers from the medical, engineering and law professions, during a period of heightened questioning of accounting methods, bounded by the end of the dot.com boom in 2001 and the global financial crisis in 2008. Protection and expansion of a profession's core knowledge through effective research is regarded as a hallmark of ongoing professional recognition and success in winning ARC grants is one indicator of the strength of this research. Reasons for the absolute and relative performance of accounting researchers in winning ARC grants are explored.

ARC statistics for the 2000‐2008 period were analysed, along with additional data from the relevant professional associations and the Commonwealth Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations.

The results indicate that Australian accounting researchers are performing poorly in absolute and relative terms when compared with their professional peers. Some evidence exists that accounting research cultures seem to flourish in only a handful of universities, and that accounting academics are overloaded with teaching to the detriment of research.

The study adds to the growing interest in the value added by accounting research to the accounting profession, the corporate sector and society at large. While the publishing record of Australian accounting researchers appears healthy, when compared with their accounting peers overseas, they perform poorly in winning competitive grants relative to researchers from other professions. This may be a timely wakeup call to the accounting profession that the social acceptance of accounting knowledge should not be taken for granted.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the interplay of organizational humorous teasing and workplace bullying in hospital work life in order to investigate how workplace bullying can emerge from doctors and nurses experiences of what, at first, appears as “innocent” humorous interactions.

Based on an ethnographic field study among doctors and nurses at Rigshospitalet (University Hospital of Copenhagen, Denmark) field notes, transcriptions from two focus groups and six in-depth interviews were analyzed using a cross-sectional thematic analysis.

This study demonstrates how bullying may emerge out of a distinctive joking practice, in which doctors and nurses continually relate to one another with a pronounced degree of derogatory teasing. The all-encompassing and omnipresent teasing entails that the positions of perpetrator and target persistently change, thereby excluding the position of bystander. Doctors and nurses report that they experience the humiliating teasing as detrimental, although they feel continuously forced to participate because of the fear of otherwise being socially excluded. Consequently, a concept of “fluctuate bullying” is suggested wherein nurses and doctors feel trapped in a “double bind” position, being constrained to bully in order to avoid being bullied themselves.

The present study add to bullying research by exploring and demonstrating how workplace bullying can emerge from informal social power struggles embedded and performed within ubiquitous humorous teasing interactions.