Dilemmas in accounting research and implication for management

Abstract

This paper engages in a review and discussion of some problems confronting accounting research and the implication for management. It is motivated by seeming doubt regarding the functionality of accounting research in updating accounting information to meet social, environmental and economic challenges that is associated with contemporary managements problems. The methodological approach is rooted in reviews. The dilemmas that the paper revealed are methodological dilemma, curriculum mismatch and application of research to practice. These dilemmas have some tendencies of asphyxiating innovation in accounting research. The paper points out that accounting is deeply implicated in allocation of social and economic resources, hence aligning accounting research purely toward economic bias is asymmetry of accounting function and may be dysfunctional in attending to and assisting with the contemporary management problems. Accounting researchers must therefore wake up to the realities of pluralism in accounting research which may accommodate and contribute to resolving social behavioural and political problems of management. The paper makes modest suggestions for making accounting research meet the exigencies of modern management problems. These includes the need for curriculum redesign to embrace management and social theories and research methodology in first degree accounting curriculum; the need for accounting research to embrace pluralism of paradigms to enhance its ability to assist in solving diverse management problems; and the need for accounting research to reflect management practice to explore the applicability of accounting theories, standards and techniques to management problems. There is scant literature linking accounting research dilemmas to management, hence the budding ideas in this paper offer agenda for a continuing research toward innovation in accounting research