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This study aims to answer the research question of how a calculative regime for public universities is implemented, how and under which conditions its symbolic use emerges and what kind of unintended consequences occur over time.

The empirical material presented in the paper derives methodically from a longitudinal qualitative research approach analyzing higher education systems (HES)-reforms in Austria. To better understand the consequences of the organizational changes in line with the new legal framework, 2 series of qualitative interviews in 2011/2012 and 2016/2017 on the field level and the organizational level were conducted.

Identifying two enabling consequences from the tactical behaviors of resistance and symbolic use, i.e. new processes of communication and horizontal network building, allows for theory-building with a focus on the dynamics how accounting begins, then next becomes an established infrastructure, is then destabilized and re-elaborated before it becomes, again, an infrastructure which is different from before.

Although the findings are based on a national empirical context, they are linked to the international discourse on HES in transition and the role of calculative regimes including performance measurement and management attitudes and instruments. They are relevant for an international research community open-minded toward differentiated case studies in a longitudinal perspective on HES-reforms.

When reflecting on their own specific settings governing bodies and practitioners managing the transition of HES may find insights from longitudinal case studies inspiring. The dynamics initiated by new calculative regimes installed need a sensitive framework to handle dissent, resistance, tactical behaviors and changes in power relations between the field level and the organizational level.

This is a unique longitudinal case study of the Austrian HES and its public universities in transition.

The purpose of this paper is to present the findings of a longitudinal study on the use of mandatory knowledge balance sheets (KBS) in Austrian public universities. It contributes to the discourse on fourth-stage intellectual capital (IC) research. Conclusions drawn from the analysis of the empirical material are expected to focus further research on fourth-stage IC and to improve practices of IC disclosure.

A mandatory KBS has been used to govern the Austrian Higher Education Institution sector for more than a decade. In a qualitative longitudinal case study, the authors analyze two series of qualitative interviews and documents in order to reveal functional and dysfunctional effects of the KBS in use.

The conclusions focus on the communicative culture in the implementation process, the way change processes are organized and the value of strategy for orientation, sense making and an effective allocation of resources.

The practical implications are twofold: first, to identify aspects of monetary, utilitarian, social and environmental value dimensions, a concerted effort to embed quantitative data in a discourse on qualitative impact on value would be needed. Second, the authors support a “communicative culture first” rather than a “tool-box first” approach.

Original empirical data have been gathered in a longitudinal study of a valuable and unique case. Retrospectively, a better understanding of the top-down implementation of the KBS and its pitfalls is achieved.

In 2001, the Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal (AAAJ) published a special issue entitled “Managing, measuring and reporting intellectual capital for the new millennium”. After 20 years, we revisit the eight articles in this special issue to trace early developments in interdisciplinary intellectual capital (IC) accounting research, link these developments to the current state of play, and set out an agenda for future research. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

This paper, written reflectively, includes an impact assessment of the articles using citation analysis and a thematic framing of the prominent issues they discussed. We critically reflect on the status of these eight foundational papers after 20 years, before presenting propositions for a multidisciplinary IC research future.

We find that IC research needs to extend beyond organisational boundaries to help improve human rights, human dignity and the human condition as part of the wider interdisciplinary accounting project. We argue that fifth stage IC research can assist because it explores beyond organisational boundaries and helps address the wicked problems of the world.

This paper only investigates the themes found in the AAAJ special issue. However, the implications for researchers are intended to be transformational because, to go forward and help resolve the material issues facing society and the planet, researchers need to move from being observers to participants.

We argue that IC researchers must embrace both interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary IC research. This requires IC researchers to reflect on what they are trying to achieve and which issues facing the planet are material.

It is important to have a literature review to open any special issue as a way of introducing the state-of-the-art topics and link past research with the papers appearing in this special issue on IC in education. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

This research uses the structured literature to investigate the state-of-the-art and future directions of IC literature in education. In total, 47 articles are explored including nine from this special issue.

IC in education research is concentrated in Europe and mainly addresses IC in universities. Additionally, current IC research is progressing by examining IC practices inside universities using a third-stage IC approach, with new research also concentrating on third-mission outcomes, thus there is scope to continue IC and education research beyond universities. IC in education can also expand into fifth stage IC research, which abandons the boundaries of the educational institution and concentrate on the impact of IC and education on multiple stakeholders.

Current IC in education research is too narrow and mainly investigates IC in European contexts using case study methodology. However, there is ample scope to widen research that develops new frameworks in different educational and country contexts using a wider range of research methodologies. IC in education needs to expand its boundaries so it does not lose its relevance, and thus be able to contribute to wider policy debates.

This paper presents the current state-of-the-art structured literature review of the articles investigating IC in education.

This paper aims to critically review intellectual capital (IC) accounting research and practices in European public universities, specifically in Spain, Austria and Italy. These three countries represent the majority of IC accounting research related to universities.

This study critically reviews a selection of university-based IC accounting research, applying Alvesson and Deetz’s (2000) critical perspectives of insight, critique and transformative redefinition.

The analysis reveals that European public universities follow the Humboldtian model of higher education, integrating a third mission to society into their traditional roles as teaching and research institutions. This study explored how the emergence of a third mission for the university was conceptualised. This study also provided insights, critique and a transformative redefinition to advance IC as a strategic resource in European public universities.

The findings provide academics and policymakers with insights, critique and a transformative redefinition of IC as a strategic resource for European public universities to meet future challenges in an ever-changing world.

The study aims to report empirical evidence on the impact of mandatory adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) in India on the voluntary intellectual capital reporting (ICR) and its value relevance. The study also tests the effect of term-weighting schemes used for information retrieval studies in the domain area of ICR.

The study uses computational linguistics tools to measure ICR by Indian firms in the period 2014–2019. The study developed term frequencies for 23 ICR attributes using bag-of-words methodology from the annual reports. The word counts were used to construct two distinct measures of ICR, quantity and quality, deploying different term-weighting schemes, equal weighting and the term frequency-inverted document frequency (TF-IDF) weighting, respectively. A combination of parametric and non-parametric tests has been employed to examine the different hypothesis.

The quantity of ICR was found to have increased post-IFRS adoption. However, the quality of ICR had fallen significantly, which resulted in the loss of value relevance of ICR. Firms making higher disclosures but of inferior quality experienced suboptimal market returns. Variation in inter-firm ICR has reduced. Size effect and sector effect continue but have attenuated. The study acknowledges the enormous impact of term-weighting schemes, used for information retrieval studies, in the domain area of ICR.

The study strongly adds to the momentum in favour of a formal ICR standard to improve its quality, restore its value relevance and facilitate more effective decision-making where the valuation of a firm is a critical input. The study presages the firms not to make poor-quality disclosures to avoid suboptimal stock performance.

The study sheds light on the impact of the adoption of post-IFRS on ICR in India. The study establishes the effect of term-weighting schemes, used for linguistic studies, in the domain area of ICR and adds to the literature by explaining one of the critical reasons for the dichotomy in ICR trends.

The purpose of this paper is to shed light on the role of and relationships between human, structural and relational capital assets for strategic management in a farm business. In particular, it analyzes the interaction between human capital’s creativity skills and the introduction of climate-smart technologies for the competitiveness of the firm.

An explorative case study was conducted on one of the largest Italian farm businesses to gain an understanding of the drivers of intellectual capital (IC) and of their implications for strategic management. Full-time employees’ perception of the skills required to achieve strategic goals and their perception of whether they possessed these abilities were investigated to determine if an alignment was present. The skills were subsequently classified using the framework of Amabile (1988) into domain-relevant and creativity-relevant skills. Then, two linear regression models were used to investigate the effects of training on the acquisition of these two sets of skills.

The analysis confirmed the strategic role of interactions among human capital assets to effectively exploit the structural capital of the company. When investigating employees’ perceptions, a gap emerged about informatics capabilities and knowledge of soils. As the company’s investments in innovation are oriented to ICT technologies, the company could strengthen informatics training to enable its employees to implement effective innovation.

The paper contributes to the literature on IC by highlighting the role of interconnections of assets to align organizations with their strategic goals. Therefore, the provision of IC accounting contributes to the strategic management of human capital.

The purpose of this paper is to construct and propose a definition for intangibles derived from the resource‐based view (RBV) of the firm for use in academic research and practical applications.

Intangibles are defined as a subset of corporate resources. In this paper, various definitions for intangibles are tested against the RBV framework.

The majority of definitions in the extant literature are (implicitly or explicitly) in synchronization with the RBV. Thus, it is possible to find and propose a common definition for intangibles.

Some researchers argue that the field is still in its embryonic stages and thus the concepts might still be too fresh in order to find a stable common definition.

The paper offers a conceptual lens through which one can clearly link intangibles to strategy and offers a proposed definition of intangibles that incorporates a meta‐review of the literature.

The paper shows that it is in fact possible to accommodate various definitions of intangibles under one common framework and propose a unified characterization.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the simultaneous effect of the intellectual capital (IC) dimensions (human capital (HC), structural capital (SC), and relational capital (RC)) in enhancing the learning organization (LO) capability, specifically in the health sector.

A survey data were collected from administrative staff working in a well-known hospital in Paris. In all, 182 observations were used to test the hypotheses. The data were analyzed using multiple regression analysis.

The results illustrate that only one dimension of IC, namely HC has a positive and significant effect on the LO capability while the other two dimensions namely SC and RC were found to have no significant effect.

The current study highlights the significance of the HC in building and enhancing the LO.

Hospitals’ decision makers should play a more decisive role in the process of attracting, maintaining, and training HR. It also confirms the importance of sustaining a sound work environment that motivates HR for continuous learning.

Few studies have examined the impact of IC on the LO capability in hospitals.