Accounting Professionals’ Ethical Judgment and the Institutional Disciplinary Context: A French–US Comparison

Abstract

This paper investigates whether accounting professionals’ ethical judgment (EJ) is influenced by the disciplinary system established by the accounting profession in France and the United States. Our study first attempts to determine whether there is a link between the EJ of accounting professionals and the disciplinary context, in each country. It then performs a comparative analysis of the two nations. Our findings indicate that the judgment of American accounting professionals is correlated with the disciplinary decisions of the accountancy board. By contrast, the judgment of French accounting professionals is independent of the disciplinary context. Whereas cross-national studies have thus far attributed differences among nations mainly to cultural distance, current research shows that non-cultural national factors should also be considered. In line with this perspective, our study suggests that institutional factors, in particular the disciplinary system, may also account for the differences between French and American accounting professionals’ ethical perceptions. We support these results by highlighting some characteristics of the countries’ respective legal systems (such as the ease of the procedure, the publication and the impact of sanctions and the format of the rules), which may explain the divergences observed. We conclude by identifying implications for the independence of accounting professionals’ EJ and the risks associated with dissuasive disciplinary systems.