Search results

This paper presents the results of a survey designed to determine what tax topics are important in the educational background of a trainee accountant entering the training environment in South Africa. These topics were then compared to the 2008 tax syllabus prescribed by SAICA and taught at accredited universities in respect of the 2009 Qualifying Examination. The results indicated that the 2008 syllabus is largely meeting the expectations of respondents both in and outside public practice, although there are a number of topics that the syllabus setters and educators should reconsider when next reviewing and updating the 2008 syllabus and as part of the considerations for the new competency framework.

The fact that Departments of Accounting at South African universities, whose academic programmes are accredited by the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA), have for many years focused primarily only on the academic training of prospective chartered accountants, has established a culture that is removed from research, and this is in contrast to the nature of a university. The aim of this paper is to evaluate some recent developments in the South African academic environment that may promote a research culture and to point out the coercive role these developments may play in changing the existing culture of a Department of Accounting. The study concludes that in view of a list of specific recent developments in the national academic environment, Departments of Accounting will be forced to change course toward becoming more research oriented. A number of recommendations are made to expedite the process.

The South African government is restructuring tertiary education, and subsidies to universities that do not build and strengthen their research capacity will be severely restricted. Hence, academics must publish more research. This study used a questionnaire to gauge the personal opinions and perceptions of and attitudes towards research held by South African Accounting academics. The questionnaire was based on international debates and discourses on Accounting education and research that suggest factors that might affect research production and consumption, and on informal discussions with colleagues in the discipline. Tertiary institutions can use this constructive information to build a research culture and improve research output among these academics, by changing perceptions where needed and empowering Accounting academics to conduct research. The results indicate that the main limitations to research output are inadequate qualifications and a lack of skills with regard to conducting research (only 10 per cent of the respondents possess a doctoral degree), insufficient time for conducting research, financial factors, a lack of mentorship and departmental support, and difficulty finding research topics. The debate on “teaching versus research” is also ongoing.

Changes in business environments have challenged the competencies (technical knowledge, skills and attitudes) of professional accountants. Accounting professions have responded by developing competency frameworks. In 2008, the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA) issued a draft competency framework encapsulating a broad range of knowledge, skills and attributes. The objective of the study reported on here was to determine training officers’ perceptions of the knowledge and skills requirements of entry‐level trainee accountants. SAICA could consider the findings of this study in the finalisation of its competency framework. The study reveals that nearly three‐quarters of all the topics in the current prescribed SAICA syllabus are considered to make at least an important contribution to the knowledge requirements of entry‐level trainee accountants. Although more than half the management accounting topics prescribed in the SAICA syllabus are perceived as being only reasonably important, further statistical analysis revealed that TOPP (training outside public practice) training officers disagreed significantly with their TIPP (training inside public practice) counterparts on the importance of management accounting topics and perceived them to be at least important. Except for specialised topics, all other topics covering the remaining core subjects (Financial Accounting, Financial Management, Taxation and Auditing) were perceived to be important or even more than important by the respondents. The study demonstrates that there is a movement towards an expanded set of competencies beyond the technical knowledge typically taught to prospective CAs, and that there is evidence of a need for today’s entry‐level trainee accountants to receive training in communication, analytical, interpersonal and computer skills.

This paper aims to examine the influence of academics who are members of the profession on academic institutions.

An analytic autoethnography of the influence of accounting academics who are members of the profession on South African universities, supported by publicly available information, such as policy and other documents, web sites, and published material; documentation the authors are able to gather as participants; and formal and informal interviews the authors conduct with academic managers.

The paper finds that profession-identifying academics create and maintain rules and structures within academe, rules and structures that suit the profession. Managers who are members of the profession identify more closely with the profession than with their university. The analysis reveals the mechanics of this influence, as well as the consequences.

The paper contributes to theory by synthesizing the creation of profession-inspired institutions framework and the maintenance of an institutions framework into a single framework. It also applies the theory by providing an example of a profession creating and maintaining institutionalization in an adjacent institution. The findings have implications for academia in cases where academic staff members are members of professional bodies, such as engineering and law faculties. The insights highlighted here may also be of interest to Australasian, UK and US accounting academics, because the literature contains evidence of pressures from professional bodies there.

There is increasing academic pressure on Departments of Accounting in South Africa whose academic programmes are accredited with the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA). The reason for this that the academic training of potential chartered accountants has long been their main academic focus, and they often fail to do justice to their real academic mission of scholarly activity in accounting (the pursuit of science as an endeavour), which is central to the essence of a university. The quality of such departments’ research is not yet an important criterion for their prestige. However, only Departments of Accounting that develop Accounting as a social science in scholarly activity in accounting deserve international recognition. This empirical study attempts to convince Departments of Accounting, particularly those whose academic programmes are accredited by SAICA, to embark on scholarly activity in accounting as soon as possible.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how the actions of the accounting profession, the state, universities, and academics have inhibited the development of South African accounting research.

A multiple history approach using traditional archival material and oral history is used.

Since the late nineteenth-century, a network of human and non-human actors has ensured that accounting education in South Africa retained a technical focus. By prescribing and detailing the accounting syllabuses required for university accreditation, the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA) and its predecessors exercise direct control over accounting education. As a result, little appetite exists for a discipline based on academic enquiry or engagement with international scholars. While the SAICA claims to support accounting research, this support is conditional on its meeting the professional body’s particular view of scholarship.

The limitations associated with this research are that it focusses on one particular professional body in one jurisdiction. The South African situation provides a cautionary tale of how universities, particularly those in developing countries, should take care not to abdicate their responsibilities for the setting of syllabi or course content to professional bodies. Accounting academics, particularly those in a developing country currently experiencing major social, political, and economic problems, are in a prime position to engage in research that will benefit society as a whole.

Although actor network theory has been used in accounting research and in particular to explain accounting knowledge creation, the use of this particular theoretical lens to examine the construction of professional knowledge is limited. This study draws on Callon’s (1986) four moments to explain how various human actors including the accounting profession, the state, universities, and accounting academics, along with non-human actors such as accreditation, regulation, and transformation, have brought about South African academic disengagement with the discipline.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a contextual analysis of the professional accounting education system of South Africa (SA).

The paper uses the Global Model of Accounting Education (Watty et al., 2012) to describe the accounting education system of SA, which is then compared with similar case studies of Australia, Japan and Sri Lanka. Information about the SA accounting education system is contextualised from multiple sources, using data triangulation.

Several similarities between the SA accounting education system and that of Australia are found, such as the role and involvement of the professional bodies in the accreditation processes, with less similarities with that of Japan and Sri Lanka. The comparisons illuminate the economic development of each country and the level of involvement in the education programmes by the profession. Specific challenges in SA include the entrance hurdles to higher education and emphasis on an accounting degree.

The application of the Global Model of Accounting Education helps to identify the similarities in the global accounting arena and illuminates the uniqueness of the SA accounting education system. This study illustrates the establishment of an accounting education system that aligns with the International Education Standards (IESs).

The study contributes to the discussions around challenges in accounting education, specifically those associated with accreditation and a strong controlling relationship between academe and the profession.

The current syllabus (programme of education) prescribed by the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA) emphasises that it is important for students to acquire knowledge and skills in interacting with information technology (IT). One of the basic IT skills identified by SAICA is the ability of students to apply controls to personal systems in order to ensure the processing integrity of IT resources and to ensure that IT resources are secure and properly safeguarded. The research questions investigated in this article are whether and where students acquire the knowledge and skills they need in using passwords as a control mechanism, and whether they actually apply the knowledge and skills they have acquired when they access information systems and networks. On the basis of a survey, the article concludes that there is a definite increase in the level of students’ knowledge of which actions are considered to be good password practices from the time when they have recently matriculated to their third year. However, it is also clear from the results of the survey that these competencies are not yet being fully applied in the real‐world arena of accessing online password‐protected accounts.

Accounting academics in South Africa (SA) have been criticised for their lack of focus on research, stating that their primary responsibility is the teaching of prospective professional accountants. The purpose of this paper is to empirically evaluate the relationship between research and teaching and to consider why accounting academics in SA prioritise teaching over research.

The paper uses a questionnaire developed in the UK to assess SA accounting academics’ views of the teaching-research nexus. Cluster analysis is undertaken to identify and describe the patterns of responses of respondents.

The findings identify three clusters. The largest subgroup indicates an equal awareness of both the potential benefits and pitfalls of integrating teaching and research. A second subgroup views teaching and research as symbiotic, while the third subgroup sees the two activities as working against each other and competing for scarce resources. This study finds that conflict exists between professional membership and academic research, and a focus on teaching a professionally orientated accounting curriculum remains dominant in SA.

The attitudes to teaching and research within SA are likely to be dynamic and subject to change. The findings have implications for the development of accounting academics and potentially, for addressing the gap between accounting research, practice and education.

This research contributes to a significant corpus of work considering the teaching-research nexus and a nascent body of work considering the relationship of research to teaching in accounting. The findings may be of interest to policymakers, practitioners and academics.