Balancing the Public and the Private Interest – A Dilemma of Accounting Profession

Abstract

Abstract Public interest is highly important to the accounting profession because, according to the professions code of ethics, “a label of the accountancy profession is its acceptance of the responsibility to act in the public interest“(IFAC, 2011), but there is not a common consensus on what exactly is in the public interest. In the same time, the accountancy profession includes individuals and private companies profit oriented. In this circumstance, the objective of the paper is to explain the concept of public interest from both sides: the accounting profession, and expectations of the interested parties. For this, a literature review analyzes the main studies in accounting research literature that analyze public interest from a theoretical approach. This study provides an accounting conceptual framework for public interest, based on the definitions of ‘public interest,’ and the dilemma between public and private interest. Also, proposes an evaluation tool of the degree to which any policy, action, process, or condition are in the public interest. The framework and the assessment tool are “designed to provide policymakers, regulators, and business leaders with the means to more consistently assess many of the issues which are currently in debates at the national and international levels. (IFAC, 2011)