IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/journl/hal-00477759.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Keeping Accounts By The Book: The Revelation(S) Of Accounting

Author

Listed:
  • Vassili Joannides

    (GDF - Gestion, Droit et Finance - EESC-GEM Grenoble Ecole de Management)

  • Nicolas Berland

    (DRM - Dauphine Recherches en Management - Université Paris Dauphine-PSL - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique)

Abstract

Our paper addresses what the moral foundations of accounting are, regardless of capitalistic operations, as we are seeking to trace a genealogy of accounting thinking disconnected from coincidence with Capitalism. We demonstrate that the three monotheisms have bared the core of accounting. We purport to explicate how the three monotheisms (Judaism, Christianity divided into Roman Catholicism and Protestantisms, and Islam) have successively revealed the nature of accounting to moralise people's day-to-day conduct. Our approach to the revelation of accounting is informed with practice theory to study how accounting was used in believers' day-today activities and faith management. To this end, we read theological debates on accounting from Rabbinic, Islamic, Catholic and Protestant literatures raised at the time of the Reformation. Our study reveals that, in the four religions, bookkeeping serves as routine and rules to account for daily conduct, its content being contingent upon common understandings (viz. God's identity, capabilities and expectations) and teleoaffective structures (viz. definition of and ways to salvation). Through this paper, we demonstrate that accounting issues have always served as a sub-practice in moral practices and is therefore not necessarily coincidental with economic operations. Ultimately, we contribute to literature on the genesis of accounting, accounting as situated practice and accounting as moral practice.day-today activities and faith management. To this end, we read theological debates on accounting from Rabbinic, Islamic, Catholic and Protestant literatures raised at the time of the Reformation. Our study reveals that, in the four religions, bookkeeping serves as routine and rules to account for daily conduct, its content being contingent upon common understandings (viz. God's identity, capabilities and expectations) and teleoaffective structures (viz. definition of and ways to salvation). Through this paper, we demonstrate that accounting issues have always served as a sub-practice in moral practices and is therefore not necessarily coincidental with economic operations. Ultimately, we contribute to literature on the genesis of accounting, accounting as situated practice and accounting as moral practice.

Suggested Citation

  • Vassili Joannides & Nicolas Berland, 2010. "Keeping Accounts By The Book: The Revelation(S) Of Accounting," Post-Print hal-00477759, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-00477759
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-00477759
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://hal.science/hal-00477759/document
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Quattrone, Paolo, 2004. "Accounting for God: accounting and accountability practices in the Society of Jesus (Italy, XVI-XVII centuries)," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 29(7), pages 647-683, October.
    2. Barreiros, Lídia., 1985. "Towards social accounting," ILO Working Papers 992431063402676, International Labour Organization.
    3. Maltby, Josephine, 1997. "Accounting and the soul of the middle class: Gustav Freytag's Soll und Haben," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 69-87, January.
    4. Quattrone, Paolo, 2009. "Books to be practiced: Memory, the power of the visual, and the success of accounting," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 85-118, January.
    5. Gambling, Trevor, 1987. "Accounting for rituals," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 12(4), pages 319-329, June.
    6. Ahrens, Thomas & Chapman, Christopher S., 2007. "Management accounting as practice," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 32(1-2), pages 1-27.
    7. Bryer, R. A., 2000. "The history of accounting and the transition to capitalism in England. Part one: theory," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 25(2), pages 131-162, February.
    8. Bourguignon, Annick & Chiapello, Eve, 2003. "The Role of Criticism in the Dynamics of Performance Evaluation Systems," ESSEC Working Papers DR 03017, ESSEC Research Center, ESSEC Business School.
    9. Hoskin, Keith W. & Macve, Richard H., 1986. "Accounting and the examination: A genealogy of disciplinary power," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 11(2), pages 105-136, March.
    10. Hans Derks, 2008. "Religion, capitalism and the rise of double-entry bookkeeping," Accounting History Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(2), pages 187-213.
    11. Hopwood, Anthony G., 1994. "Accounting and everyday life: An introduction," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 19(3), pages 299-301, April.
    12. Gambling, Trevor, 1977. "Magic, accounting and morale," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 2(2), pages 141-151, March.
    13. Miller, Peter, 1997. "The multiplying machine," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 22(3-4), pages 355-364.
    14. Burchell, Stuart & Clubb, Colin & Hopwood, Anthony & Hughes, John & Nahapiet, Janine, 1980. "The roles of accounting in organizations and society," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 5-27, January.
    15. Eve Chiapello, 2007. "Accounting and the birth of the notion of capitalism," Post-Print hal-00466515, HAL.
    16. Davidson, Audrey B. & Ekelund, Robert Jr., 1997. "The medieval church and rents from marriage market regulations," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 215-245, February.
    17. Burchell, Stuart & Clubb, Colin & Hopwood, Anthony G., 1985. "Accounting in its social context: Towards a history of value added in the United Kingdom," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 381-413, October.
    18. John Francis McKernan & Katarzyna Kosmala, 2007. "Doing the truth: religion – deconstruction – justice, and accounting," Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 20(5), pages 729-764, September.
    19. Bryer, R. A., 2000. "The history of accounting and the transition to capitalism in England. Part two: evidence," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 25(4-5), pages 327-381, May.
    20. Miller, Peter & Napier, Christopher, 1993. "Genealogies of calculation," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 18(7-8), pages 631-647.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Constable, Philip & Kuasirikun, Nooch, 2020. "From cosmological to commercial form: A Buddhist theory of ‘form’, ‘space’ and ‘stream of re-becoming’ in mid-19th century Thai accounting," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    2. Napier, Christopher J., 2006. "Accounts of change: 30 years of historical accounting research," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 31(4-5), pages 445-507.
    3. Power, Michael, 2015. "How accounting begins: Object formation and the accretion of infrastructure," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 43-55.
    4. Mohamed Ali Dakkam, 2018. "qui et à quoi sert la comptabilité ? Un état de l'art et quelques réflexions théoriques pour dépasser le déterminisme des différents paradigmes," Post-Print hal-01907865, HAL.
    5. Carnegie, Garry D. & McBride, Karen M. & Napier, Christopher J. & Parker, Lee D., 2020. "Accounting history and theorising about organisations," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 52(6).
    6. Walker, Stephen P., 2016. "Revisiting the roles of accounting in society," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 41-50.
    7. Nhu Tuyên Le, 2009. "Liens Entre Comptabilite Et Systeme Economique : La Transition Vietnamienne," Post-Print halshs-00460227, HAL.
    8. Jones, Michael John, 2010. "Sources of power and infrastructural conditions in medieval governmental accounting," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 81-94, January.
    9. Radcliffe, Vaughan S., 1998. "Efficiency audit: An assembly of rationalities and programmes," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 23(4), pages 377-410, May.
    10. Berland, Nicolas & Chiapello, Eve, 2009. "Criticisms of capitalism, budgeting and the double enrolment: Budgetary control rhetoric and social reform in France in the 1930s and 1950s," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 28-57, January.
    11. Bigoni, Michele & Funnell, Warwick, 2015. "Ancestors of governmentality: Accounting and pastoral power in the 15th century," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 27(C), pages 160-176.
    12. Toms, J. S., 2002. "The rise of modern accounting and the fall of the public company: the Lancashire cotton mills 1870-1914," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 27(1-2), pages 61-84.
    13. Himick, Darlene, 2011. "Relative performance evaluation and pension investment management: A challenge for ESG investing," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 22(2), pages 158-171.
    14. Nikidehaghani, Mona & Cortese, Corinne & Hui-Truscott, Freda, 2021. "Accounting and pastoral power in Australian disability welfare reform," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    15. Giovanna Centorrino, 2021. "The complex power dynamics within a health care institution during the 15th and 18th centuries. The case of the Great and New Hospital of Palermo," CONTABILIT? E CULTURA AZIENDALE, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 0(1), pages 11-59.
    16. Ezzamel, Mahmoud, 2009. "Order and accounting as a performative ritual: Evidence from ancient Egypt," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 34(3-4), pages 348-380, April.
    17. Lise Justesen & Jan Mouritsen, 2011. "Effects of actor‐network theory in accounting research," Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 24(2), pages 161-193, February.
    18. Lamb, Margaret, 2001. "'Horrid appealing': accounting for taxable profits in mid-nineteenth century England," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 271-298, April.
    19. Vassili Joannides & Stéphane Jaumier, 2011. "Accounterability ou l'accountability par la bande," Grenoble Ecole de Management (Post-Print) hal-00645359, HAL.
    20. Vassili Joannides, 2012. "Accounterability and the problematics of accountability," Post-Print hal-00676561, HAL.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    religion; accounting; Catholicism; Protestantism; Judaism; Islam; Control as practice;
    All these keywords.

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-00477759. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.