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This paper analyses all articles published in Accounting History using a topic modeling technique. Previous studies focus on the content of accounting history, but not how the field has evolved. The paper complements prior assessments of the research published in Accounting History by providing measures of the relative prevalence of research areas and their evolution over time. The analysis offers insights into accounting history by refining previous categorisations, uncovering overlooked topic areas, and substantiating trends, such as the demise of interest in the technical core of accounting in favour of more variegated and fragmented approaches. The findings are discussed in light of the claimed pluralisation of methodological and theoretical approaches in this field

The scholarly and practitioner literatures have both described the potential benefits of Design Thinking (DT) to develop innovations. Innovation processes are widely characterized by continuous competing demands, which generate tensions. The paper analyzes a DT innovation journey, focusing on the struggles and triggers of participants as they work through conflicting demands. Following a qualitative inductive research design, the study reports on the experience of a group of management students exposed intentionally for the first time to the introduction of DT practices in a class setting. The originality of the paper lies in the fact that it analyzes participants' particular points of view, including feelings and cognitions, during the overall process. This angle allows identifying and describing three main struggles and triggers (destabilizing, non-deciding, abstracting) for new adopters in each step of the DT process, which represent a cultural clash with their background. The study contributes to a better understanding of DT by acknowledging its challenges and costs, to be able to apply it as an organizational resource when facing competing demands. Moreover, it aims to provide some initial steps on how to move organizations to a culture based on collaboration and experimentation, able to better cope with innovation tensions.

The article aims to explore ways of theorizing in accounting history research. The article draws on findings originating from a semi-automated text analysis by means of topic modelling of 1,300 accounting history papers published between 1996 and 2015 across six journals most relevant to the discipline. Findings show the presence of a whole range of ways of theorizing at different levels of abstraction (from narrating to conceptualizing to theorizing settings to grand theorizing). Different ways of theorizing tend to be associated not only with specific research objects but also with specific journal types. Overall, both narrating and grand theorizing are relatively decreasing in favour of mid-range theorizing approaches, which seem to be on the rise.

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This article explores governance and accounting practices in hybrid organizations. Currently, hybrid organizations represent an increasingly pervasive phenomenon, but their role has also been central in the past. To achieve this aim, we consider the case of a charity, the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, as its activity grew in scope and complexity during the sixteenth century in the Republic of Venice. The Scuole Grandi represents a form of hybrid organizations because these charities were privately managed, but publicly regulated. They shared a devotional orientation and performed de facto welfare functions in progressive integration with the State. Based on an analysis of balance sheets and administrative documents, this article aims to discuss the role of governance and accounting in enabling hybrid organizations to operate through multiple logics.