Citizen Engagement in Accounting Practices: A Systematic Review of Participatory Budgeting and Directions for Future Research

This study addresses the critical and timely gap by systematically reviewing the previous studies on PB published in accounting journals to identify new directions for future studies. Research articles on PB in local government were published in accounting journals from 1989 to 2022. Few studies on PB as an accounting innovation have been published in accounting journals. The majority of studies are qualitative and theory-based. In many situations, PB integrating citizen participation in budget development has not promoted a meaningful societal transformation. In addition, several actors have dominated the PB process, causing unanticipated repercussions. This review focuses on studies in niche accounting journals and draws conclusions from a few accounting research papers. Practitioners and researchers need to focus on how contextual factors leading to built-in failures in the local contexts require a shift in attention from public sector reforms to understanding how accounting innovation involving citizen participation works in practice, where power is genuinely distributed in vulnerable communities to promote democratic and participatory approaches like PB. Since the birth of PB in Porto Alegre in 1989, a comprehensive review from an accounting perspective has been lacking in PB research published in accounting journals.