A History of the Academy of Accounting Historians: 1989–1998

Abstract

This paper describes the evolution of The Academy of Accounting Historians from 1989 through 1998. It is a continuation of a history of the first 15 years of The Academy that appeared in the December 1989 issue of this journal by the same authors.

Accounting historiography: looking back to the future

“…The accounting history community's emergence can be found most notably in the early 1970s as evidenced for example by the first World Congress of Accounting Historians, the American Accounting Association's (AAA, 1970) Committee on Accounting History report, the founding of the Academy of Accounting Historians in the USA in 1973, the first formal meeting of the Accounting History Committee (later termed the Accounting History Special Interest Group) of the Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand (formerly titled the Accounting Association of Australia and New Zealand) in 1973, and the establishment of the National Institute of Accounting Historians in France in the mid-1970s (Coffman et al, 1998;Carnegie and Rodrigues, 2007;Richardson, 2008). Later, national accounting history bodies followed in such forms as the Italian Society of Accounting History established in 1987, the Accounting History Association Japan established in 1981, the Accounting History Research Centre of the Portuguese Association of Accountants established in 1996, the Commission of Accounting History of the Spanish Association for Accounting and Management established in 1992 and the Accounting History Committee of the China Accounting Society founded in 1983 (Carnegie and Rodrigues, 2007)[2].…”

“…A further feature of the accounting history community has been its development of specialist conferences such as the already mentioned World Congress of Accounting Historians which has convened 13 times in Europe, North America, Australia and Japan since its first conference in 1970 and its most recent in 2012 (Guvelmi and Guvelmi, 2006). Other conferences also emerged, such as various conferences within the USA hosted by the Academy of Accounting Historians, often at the same location and immediately prior to the American Accounting Association annual meetings (Coffman et al, 1998;Richardson, 2008;Carnegie and Rodrigues, 2007). Other contemporary and prominent international accounting history conferences also include the Accounting History International conference (sponsored by the journal Accounting History) and the Accounting Business and Financial History conference (then associated with the journal Accounting Business & Financial History) founded at the University of Cardiff in 1989.…”

Contributing to the international accounting history movement: Integrated forums of discourse

“…Hosted by the Accounting and Business History Research Unit of Cardiff University, this conference attracted delegates from various countries, especially from a number of Western European countries. 10 In addition, the US-based Academy of Accounting Historians -a longstanding and important association of historical accounting researchers (Carnegie and Rodrigues, 2007;Coffman et al, 1998Coffman et al, , 2014, which publishes the Accounting Historians Journal -mounted an annual research conference from 1992 (Richardson, 2008), which was most typically held in US cities in or around November of each year. 11 While the WCAH was mounted in different cities around the globe consistent with the name of the international event, the other two conferences were 'home-based' in Wales or in various North American cities.…”

Strategies in the development of accounting history as an academic discipline

“…Miranti (1993, p.114) notes: "Indeed, the American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB), the accrediting body for bachelors and masters level programs, while affirming the relevance of a business history elective, does not recognize the need for the specialized study of the past experience of accounting, finance or marketing". Coffman et al (1998) reports that the Academy of Accounting Historians liaised with the AACSB to ensure that accounting history would be considered in the accreditation standards for schools of accountancy. There is no evidence, however, that this intervention was successful.…”