In this paper, we use the investment fraud of Bernard Madoff to inquire into the production of trust in the context of financial markets. Drawing upon empirical data related to U.S. individual investors (interviews and letters) as well as documentary material, we investigate the mechanisms...

Actors at the boundary of two or more fields undertake work to stabilize, coordinate across or breach the field’s boundary. Meaning work is a key category of boundary work, which involves aintaining or changing of field-level meanings. Mobilizing institutional analysis of field level change...

This paper develops and tests new theory about the determinants of value creation in unrelated multibusiness firms from a resource-based perspective. The authors argue that the availability of "headquarter resources", which are at the basis of headquarter services provided to the business units,...

In a context of development of international capital markets, it seems to be interesting to question the adaptation of French groups to Anglo-American practices. The objective of the present paper is to illustrate the evolution towards the Anglo-American standards through the study of one aspect...

This book is an attempt to construct a classification (or division) of intangibles, consisting of a diversity of approaches that deals with this concept. It includes eleven papers which have been divided into three sections based on their approach and what we can learn from them: (1) regulation...

We examine how mark-to-market accounting affects investment decisions in an agency model with reputation concerns. Reporting the current market value of a firm's assets in the financial statements can serve as a disciplining device because the information contained in the market price provides a...

This paper proposes a critical stance on research into the rarity of women at the highest levels of accountancy. The authors aim to unravel the discourses produced on this topic in the accounting literature and question their own experience and perception as scholars building on Bourdieu’s...

It is often stressed that the process of IASC standard setting and its output are very much influenced by the Anglo-American accounting approach. This is considered to be one of the major reasons for the obvious reluctance of countries to adopt the international accounting standards. The...

Accounts manipulations have been a matter of research, discussion and, even, controversy in several countries such as the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and France. The objective of this paper is to elaborate a general framework for classifying accounts manipulations...

The objective of this paper is to illustrate that the change in shareholders’ attitude towards firms (from stakeholder model to shareholder model) influences the accounting treatments of goodwill. This study is based on four countries (Great Britain, the United States, Germany, and France) and...