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Article
Publication date: 21 June 2011

Warwick Funnell and Jeffrey Robertson

The purpose of this paper is to examine sixteenth century Netherlands business organisation and accounting practices, then the most advanced in Western Europe, to test Sombart's…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine sixteenth century Netherlands business organisation and accounting practices, then the most advanced in Western Europe, to test Sombart's theory that scientific double entry bookkeeping was an essential prerequisite for the development of modern capitalism and the emergence of the public corporation during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Rather than being a development of Paciolian bookkeeping, doubleentry bookkeeping in sixteenth century Netherlands was grounded in northern German (Hanseatic) business practices.

Design/methodology/approach

Sixteenth century Dutch business records and Dutch and German bookkeeping texts are used to establish that north German Hanseatic commercial practices exercised the greatest influence on The Netherlands' bookkeeping practices immediately prior to the development of the capitalistic commercial enterprise in the first years of the seventeenth century.

Findings

Contrary to Sombart's thesis, scientific doubleentry bookkeeping was rarely used in sixteenth century Netherlands, which became Europe's most sophisticated commercial region during the late sixteenth century and early seventeenth century. Instead, extant commercial archives and the numerous sixteenth century accounting texts suggest that Hanseatic business practices and agents' (factors') bookkeeping were the dominant influence on northern Netherlands' business practices at this time. The organisation and administrative practices of Netherlands' businesses prior to the seventeenth century, especially their decentralised structure and lack of a common capital, were founded on Hanseatic practices that were considerably different to the best Italian practice of the time.

Research limitations/implications

North German influences on Dutch accounting and business practices have significant implications for social theories of the development of capitalism, notably that of Bryer, that assume the use of a scientific (capitalistic) form of doubleentry bookkeeping was essential to the development of capitalism from the seventeenth century. This is tested in a subsequent paper which examines the accounting practices of the Dutch East India Company (Verenigde Oost‐Indische Compagnie or VOC) which was founded in 1602 at the very cusp of modern capitalism. The research presented here was partially constrained by the scarcity of transcriptions of original sixteenth century bookkeeping records.

Originality/value

The vigorous debate in the accounting history literature about the dependence of modern capitalism upon a scientific (capitalistic) form of double entry bookkeeping prompted by Sombart has been mainly concerned with England. This paper introduces into the debate material which documents the accounting and business practices of the most commercially advanced region of Europe in the late sixteenth century and the influence of Dutch bookkeeping texts.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 24 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 21 January 2022

Angélica Vasconcelos, Alan Sangster and Lúcia Lima Rodrigues

The main aim of this paper is to illustrate the importance of avoiding Whig interpretations in historical research. It does so by highlighting examples of what may occur when this…

Abstract

Purpose

The main aim of this paper is to illustrate the importance of avoiding Whig interpretations in historical research. It does so by highlighting examples of what may occur when this is not done. The paper also aims to promote interdisciplinarity, in the form of working with those from other disciplines, as a means to avoid this occurring.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper includes an in-depth study of the bookkeeping and financial reporting of two 18th century Portuguese state-sponsored companies using archival sources. The companies were selected because of conflicting insights across disciplines concerning the quality of their bookkeeping and financial reporting – historians have been very critical, while accounting historians have seen little wrong. These differences of opinion have never previously been investigated. The authors demonstrate how information was distributed among the account books and other records of the two companies. The approach adopted enabled a reader to fully understand the recorded economic events. The authors also present and explain the procedures, criteria and accounting terminology used in their annual reports.

Findings

This paper demonstrates how easy is to inadvertently adopt a Whig interpretation of accounting history when the focus of interest is something of which the principal researcher has insufficient understanding or expertise. It also illustrates how important it is to embrace interdisciplinarity by working with those from other discipline to avoid doing so.

Research limitations/implications

The conclusions from the case study are company-specific and cannot be generalised beyond those companies. However, the implications of this study go beyond the companies in its illustration of the importance of fully understanding historical evidence within its own context.

Originality/value

This paper unveils primary archival sources never previously presented in the literature. It also contributes to the literature by providing an evidence-based justification for the calls previously made to accounting historians to study accounting in its social context and engage with historians from other disciplines.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 35 no. 6
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 20 June 2016

Ian Mann, Warwick Funnell and Robert Jupe

The purpose of this paper is to contest Edwards et al.’s (2002) findings that resistance to the introduction of double-entry bookkeeping and the form that it took when implemented…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to contest Edwards et al.’s (2002) findings that resistance to the introduction of double-entry bookkeeping and the form that it took when implemented by the British Government in the mid-nineteenth century was the result of ideological conflict between the privileged landed aristocracy and the rising merchant middle class.

Design/methodology/approach

The study draws upon a collection of documents preserved as part of the Grigg Family Papers located in London and the Thomson Papers held in the Mitchell Library in Sydney. It also draws on evidence contained within the British National Archive, the National Maritime Museum and British Parliamentary Papers which has been overlooked by previous studies of the introduction of DEB.

Findings

Conflict and delays in the adoption of double-entry bookkeeping were not primarily the product of “ideological” differences between the influential classes. Instead, this study finds that conflict was the result of a complex amalgam of class interests, ideology, personal antipathy, professional intolerance and ambition. Newly discovered evidence recognises the critical, largely forgotten, work of John Deas Thomson in developing a double-entry bookkeeping system for the Royal Navy and the importance of Sir James Graham’s determination that matters of economy would be emphasised in the Navy’s accounting.

Originality/value

This study establishes that crucial to the ultimate implementation of double-entry bookkeeping was the passionate, determined support of influential champions with strong liberal beliefs, most especially John Deas Thomson and Sir James Graham. Prominence was given to economy in government.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 29 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 7 January 2015

This chapter examines the development of accounting thought and practices in China with the purpose of illustrating its relevance to current accounting policies and practices. The…

Abstract

This chapter examines the development of accounting thought and practices in China with the purpose of illustrating its relevance to current accounting policies and practices. The review indicates that changes in accounting in China did not usually occur completely and easily. Over the past three decades, while Chinese accounting has gradually moved toward the Anglo-American model, convergence has presented unique features in China. For example, the review suggests that the accounting reforms in China have been heavily government-driven and that uniform accounting systems still remain. Chinese regulators maintain a cautious attitude toward the application of fair value and professional judgment, which are essentially the center of the Anglo-American accounting system. Furthermore, Chinese accounting regulators have a different view of business combinations from the IASB and have developed alternative accounting methods for those transactions. China’s departure from IFRS reflects its politico-economic context and essentially challenges the IASB’s goal of achieving international accounting convergence. China’s approach to internationally acceptable practices is likely to have implications for the effectiveness of the imported ideas.

Details

Adoption of Anglo-American Models of Corporate Governance and Financial Reporting in China
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78350-898-3

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 5 January 2010

S. Mc_W Cheryl and Yannick Lemarchand

The purpose of this paper is to extend to accounting and accounting texts the arguments of Phillips which suggest that organisational analysis can be enriched by a greater…

2029

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to extend to accounting and accounting texts the arguments of Phillips which suggest that organisational analysis can be enriched by a greater interface with narrative fiction as a means to bring organisations to life. The paper also introduces the work of Bottin which argues that accounting manuals can be considered as source documents for economic history, more than simply being of purely pedagogical value. Both approaches inform the research into the specialised accounting manual, the Guide du Commerce of Gaignat de l'Aulnais.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper uses archival‐based historical methods to examine the Guide du Commerce and the social and economic milieu presented therein. It has developed its analysis through the examination of both primary and secondary sources to underscore the business and social networks of the milieu and to illustrate accounting as narrative.

Findings

In his manual, Gaignat recreates merchant activities and commercial relations of eighteenth century France. Gaignat does not content himself with re‐copying material at his disposal or with creating fictitious examples. Rather, through his in‐depth development of case studies and examples of actual accounting methods, he offers the reader insights into the strategic nature of the social and economic milieu in which commercial success might be achieved.

Practical implications

The research approach is transferable to other settings, motivating renewed interest in the history of accounting literature. The stories related in the Guide du Commerce point to the potential value of accounting manuals and other similar documents as historical sources when such sources no longer exist or are limited.

Originality/value

The research method is original in that the methodological approach is new to accounting history, but part of a debate within history more generally.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 23 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 October 2000

Michael‐Burkhard Piorkowsky

Following an introduction to household accounting in Germany, the paper presents the results of research projects on accounting practices in private households and reports on the…

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Abstract

Following an introduction to household accounting in Germany, the paper presents the results of research projects on accounting practices in private households and reports on the subsequent development of a new household accounting system. The empirical research suggested that accounting records were kept on a regular basis in 27 per cent of German households. It was discovered that self‐developed bookkeeping systems were predominantly used for that purpose. The research findings on household accounting practices were used to inform the design of Das Neue Haushaltsbuch (The New Housekeeping Book). The article charts the development of a number of variants of this prototype including a bookkeeping system which permits parallel reporting in the Deutschmark and the Euro, a system designed for use by budgeting advice services, and a pocket‐money book for children.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 13 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 24 October 2008

Delfina Gomes, Garry D. Carnegie and Lúcia Lima Rodrigues

The purpose of this paper is to look at the adoption of double entry bookkeeping at the Royal Treasury, Portugal, on its establishment in 1761 and the factors contributing to this…

2461

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to look at the adoption of double entry bookkeeping at the Royal Treasury, Portugal, on its establishment in 1761 and the factors contributing to this development. The Royal Treasury was the first central government organization in Portugal to adopt double entry bookkeeping and was a crucial first step in the institutionalisation of the technique in Portuguese public administration.

Design/methodology/approach

Set firmly in the archive, this paper adopts new institutional sociology (NIS) to inform the findings of the local, time‐specific accounting policy and practice at the Portuguese Royal Treasury.

Findings

Embedded within the broader European context, this study identifies the key pressures exerted upon the Royal Treasury on its formation in 1761, which resulted in major accounting change within Portuguese central government from that date. The study provides further evidence of the importance of the state in the institutionalization of accounting practices by means of coercive pressures and highlights for Portugal the importance of individual actors who, as powerful change agents, made key decisions that influenced accounting change.

Originality/value

This study examines a major instance of accounting change in European central government and broadens the application of NIS in accounting history research to a different country – Portugal – and to a different time – the eighteenth century. It also serves to illuminate the difficulties of collecting pertinent evidence pertaining to this long‐dated time period in identifying certain forms of institutional pressures.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 21 no. 8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 March 1999

Dale Buckmaster and Elizabeth Buckmaster

Chaucer’s Shipman’s Tale is a satire of late medieval mercantile culture, and it is replete with commercial and accounting language. Literary critics have examined some of the…

1101

Abstract

Chaucer’s Shipman’s Tale is a satire of late medieval mercantile culture, and it is replete with commercial and accounting language. Literary critics have examined some of the relevant commercial elements such as the influence of double entry bookkeeping and the operations of late medieval foreign exchange markets. This paper introduces the tale to accounting historians by reviewing the literature that examines the business and accounting elements. A review of the critical studies helps us avoid misreading the tale and, thus, distorting inferences about the role of the merchant and his practices in medieval society. There are, however, a number of instances where critics may have misread the tale because of inadequate understanding of accounting and accounting history. Also, we find critics’ descriptions of accounting and business practices to be less efficient and precise than the sources upon which they relied. We conclude that literary critics would benefit from collaboration with an accounting historian when making inferences about technical issues. Further, accounting historians will benefit as well from collaboration with the appropriate literature specialist when attempting to analyze a piece of literature as history.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 12 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Abstract

Details

Harold Cecil Edey: A Collection of Unpublished Material from a 20th Century Accounting Reformer
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78973-670-0

Article
Publication date: 13 September 2013

Ken Ogata and Gary Spraakman

The purpose of this paper is to ascertain whether the deinstitutionalization of management accounting is better described using structuration theory (techniques are reproduced…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to ascertain whether the deinstitutionalization of management accounting is better described using structuration theory (techniques are reproduced until replaced) or sedimentation (layering of a new technique upon an earlier technique).

Design/methodology/approach

An archival study of management accounting at the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) between 1670 and 2005.

Findings

With the delegitimation of management accounting at the HBC, both structuration and sedimentation processes occurred. However, delegitimation did not mean all of the techniques within a set were eliminated. Several management accounting techniques often continued from one set to another (e.g. indents, outfits, standards of trade) reflecting continued reproduction of existing practices. Sometimes new techniques were added to allegedly make the set more effective, but these overlays did not always replace the former.

Research limitations/implications

The usual limitations of single firm study generalizations.

Practical implications

The research provides practitioners with insights into how management accounting practices change. With change some aspects of management accounting will remain the same.

Originality/value

This case study is based upon a unique primary archival. The HBC has made its accounting and other corporate records available to the public for the period 1670‐1970. The archival data set is supplemented by access to some of the Company's private (and more recent) corporate records, plus interviews with retired and existing senior managers about these changes to their management accounting techniques, up to 2005. Therefore, this study is based upon an extensive, unique and robust longitudinal data set.

Details

Journal of Accounting & Organizational Change, vol. 9 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1832-5912

Keywords

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