Maria-Gabriella Baldarelli

Pink accounting in Italy: cultural perspectives over discrimination and/or lack of interest

Purpose - The issue of gender inequality in the Italian universities and academic context does not seem to be particularly debated and is really rare. Starting from this “lack of interest”, the paper aims to inquire into the “state-of-the-art” of existing inequality in the scientific and academic path of Italian female scholars and academia, answering the following research question: Is discrimination between women and men linked to the number of scientific contributions in periodicals and their presence within academic boards of scientific accounting associations and journals in Italy? Design/methodology/approach - The methodology is primarily developed through a deductive analysis of the literature strands concerning gender accounting, accounting in academia and the role of women in universities and academia. Second, within the inductive perspective, the authors have chosen to inquire into the scientific publications of women on the oldest Italian journal in the accounting field – the Rivista Italiana di Ragioneria e di Economia Aziendale (RIREA). Subsequently, the position and career of women were analysed in academia investigating their presence and role within the boards of a sample of Italian journals and the main Italian accounting scientific associations Findings - Accordingly, this paper concentrates on gender inequalities in university and academia in Italy and on eventual obstacles that get in the way of the existence of scientific contributions in journals and of career progress of those women who carry on scholarly work in accounting. Research limitations/implications - The analysis confirms the need to open more space for women at the summits of political, economic and cultural institutions, including accounting academia and scientific journals. The paper has some limitations concerning the consideration of only Italian journals and academic associations. Then, we will develop the analysis in comparative terms, as attention will be addressed on the participation in scientific committees and boards of some of the major international scientific associations of accounting. Moreover, we will consider the narrative approach describing the stories of Italian women and accounting scholars to carefully investigate the reasons for this persistent discrimination. Originality/value - The innovative contribution of the paper is due to the fact that the authors are unaware of previous studies aimed at investigating if female accounting scholars are under-represented compared to their male colleagues within the top positions of the most prestigious Italian accounting associations and scientific journals. Previous research also did not investigate the existence of correlation between Italian women’s scientific productivity, their under-representation within academia and scientific career.

The Relationships Between CSR, Good Governance and Accountability in the Economy of Communion (EoC) Enterprises

The chapter aims to propose a reflection on the new frontiers of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and the principles and practices of good governance that are based on the experience of the Economy of Communion (EoC) enterprises which can be defined as companies with an “ideal motive” in that they are the results of a charismatic founder (Chiara Lubich) and the fruit of an ethical substratum, that directs every field of human behavior and, therefore, that economic behavior too.

Account(Ing)-Ability and “Charisma”: Conceptual Network and Implementation

Abstract Especially in these times of financial crisis, the processes of corporate measurement and accountability have, partially, demonstrated not being totally able to consider all the operations. This paper is based on certain considerations, which came to the surface while reading various articles and contributions of authors from differing schools of thought, who have pushed us to pay attention to the role which, as scholars, we must carry out in society, especially to contribute to the construction of a better world. The research question of this paper is: “what are relationships between accountability and charisma?”

ACCOUNTING HARMONIZATION FOR SME-S IN EUROPE: SOME REMARKS ON IFRS FOR SME-S AND EMPIRICAL EVIDENCES

Abstract The debate on accounting truth is an old problem (Briloff, 1979) and it is at present more and more important in harmonization process, especially involving small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Their users’ needs regarding the extents and type of accounting information as well as the costs of their providing are widely discussed as the arguments for differential reporting for SMEs, although there is still more literature focusing on financial reporting of large enterprises. The standards setters try to decrease the reporting burden for SMEs, keeping the relevant information for their reports users, while considering harmonization goals in the same time. In such an attempt, the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) issued an International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) designed for use by small and medium-sized entities (SMEs) the 9th of July 2009, however some national European standard-setters seem not to be keen to introduce them. The aim of our paper is to analyze, the attempts and difficulties to reach all these goals in the same time and to implement the IFRS for SMEs, such as drawn by the IASB, in the European countries. Croatian experiences presented, running from International Accounting Standards (IAS) implementation as obligatory for all the companies, towards Croatian Financial Reporting Standards (CFRS) introduction for SMEs, represent an interesting experiment in the European context.

Social Accounting in Italy: The Pioneering Contribution of Women Scholars

The theme of women scholars’ role and their contribution to initially promote social and environmental accounting and reporting is relatively new. Consequently there are many gaps to fill in concerning several topics developed within the aforementioned emerging research strand.

Educating for Sustainability: Perspectives and Critical Notes on Accounting Scholars’ Role in Higher Education

Abstract Education for sustainable development represents a relevant issue that allows Universities to lead and respond to social needs towards a more sustainable life and a complete change in the global paradigm of education and involvement of society. A crucial point for developing a culturally sensitive vision is to deepen the scholars’ genuine commitment to sustainability. A pillar of sustainability education should rest on authenticity, intended as coherence between the scholars’ research and teaching arguments relative to sustainability and the concrete behaviors held in their professional and personal spheres of life. Starting from this premise, the papers aims to inquire if there is a decoupling between the concepts scholars contribute to promote within the sustainability discourse and the real practice of sustainability in their personal and professional experience. “Is there a missing link between what scholars teach and study, thereby contributing to sustainability research and their daily choices and style of life?” After having presented the research design and the methodological approach adopted to empirically investigate the phenomenon the attention has been focused on the social and environmental accounting research literature, where some contributions claim for the presence of “blue meanies” that invade the world of scholarship, reflection, collegiality and hinder the development of challenges toward sustainability. The preliminary results of the explorative study suggest that a lot of tension related to education for sustainability improve the transfer of sustainable values and attitudes within the scientific community and the students, while several factors hinder sustainable behaviors in the daily professional and personal life of scholars, thus undermining relationships which are a pillar of sustainability.

Environmental Accounting: Conceptual Framework

With the rise of industrial facilities in the world, more and more costs and losses for activities related to environmental protection. Their value is already hundreds of billions of dollars and they are largely covered by plants using natural resources. For this reason, in many industrialized countries are beginning to try to accommodate the environmental performance of the industry back in the 70s of the twentieth century.

New Challenges for the Enterprise in the Age of “Sustainable Modernity”

Whenever we wish to analyze the corporate information system of any company, we need to remember that: 1. All corporate information systems must be structured in such a way as to offer useful data for the decision and result control (data for both internal and external use). 2. All corporate information systems must be structured respecting a precise principle of general order on the basis of which the information produced, whether compulsory or not as the case may be, must highlight the existence of an explicit correlation between (a) the aims pursued by the single company; (b) the organizational structure – as an institutional setup of the single company – which, once having decided on the goals to pursue, defines and implements the strategies and policies needed for achieving them; and (c) the whole set of accounting and non-accounting procedures, with the aim of producing information needed to decide and check.

From Weak to Strong CSR: The Contribution of New Categories in the Account(ing) Ability of EoC Industrial Parks

The aim of this paper is to highlight some innovative dimensions of corporate social responsibility (CSR) that implicate the application of a charisma in the business context through the “pillars” of dialogue, trust, reciprocity and universal fraternity. These dimensions affect the mission, the governance and the accountability of the companies that are part of the Economy of Communion project (EoC). In particular, attention is paid to the EoC industrial parks that have become popular in the world and their characteristics will be compared to other types of business combinations, in which CSR plays a central role because of the goals that they have set themselves. Consequently, we will analyze the Italian EoC industrial pole based in Incisa Valdarno (Florence, Italy) focusing on the accountability approach here adopted by identifying the advantages and disadvantages of the combination of traditional accounting instruments with new tools that have yet to be designed to better express and communicate the innovative and creative business combinations.

Some Tools and Standards for Reporting

In the field of environmental and ethical-social accountability models present in Italy, it is possible to distinguish between process standards (SA 8000; Accountability model 1000, Q-RES project, Copenhagen Charter) and product standards (Bagnoli 2010). The latter include the GRI model; the GBS model, which is the subject of this chapter; the unified standard ABI/IBS; the Federcasse model; and the Italian Ministry of Labor and Social Policy (CSR-SC Project 2003) (see Baldarelli 2007; Biglietti 2004). The management systems are placed alongside the accountability models and integrated reporting models (see Chap. 3).