Reflection on learning (both on content and process), and on the knowledge resulting from that learning, provides many benefits. The chief of these, in the context of thinking about, and within, accounting as practice and academic discipline, is that reflection can help us to turn experience...

Since rail privatization the performance of passenger services has received considerable publicity and comment, but that of the rail freight industry has received scant attention. The freight operators, industry planners and regulators, and governments have proclaimed it a ‘success story’...

The measurement of business performance addresses issues central to business history and this paper examines the evidence on rates of return for UK risk-bearing capital across the period 1855-1914. Existing series, based on the archival records of individual companies and on market data, provide...

The paper analyses the concept of ‘user needs’, which has been widely adopted by official bodies as the basis of a conceptual framework for financial reporting, including the ASB in the UK, following the lead of the FASB in the US. The user needs approach is essentially deductive: if users...

This paper explores the nature of audit automation as control within audit firms. The themes of the paper are control over the work process and audit staff, deskilling and resistance, and competition, which are analysed using the theoretical framework provided by Coombs et al., who applied...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the claim that Western accounting reforms, in particular the adoption of International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSASs) would enhance transparency and accountability and reduce corruption in patronage-based developing countries such...

Recounts how medieval English Jewry began when Jews were invited to immigrate by William I and ended with their expulsion by Edward I in 1290. The Jewish community was important and for most of its existence it was prosperous, owing to its particular social function – being the bankers,...