Epistemology and management science: Is accounting history still a legitimate subject of study?

• Published in: Accounting history Vol. 22; no. 4; pp. 450 - 471
• Main Authors: Yves Levant, Henri Zimnovitch
• Format: Journal Article
• Published: 01.11.2017
• Subjects: Accounting; Historiography; Knowledge, Theory of; Legitimacy of governments; Management science; France
• ISSN: 1032-3732

Is there any point in researching accounting history? To answer this question, the first part of this article considers some epistemological ideas based on Popperian and pragmatist philosophies. Using the conceptual framework developed by the philosopher Andre Comte-Sponville, the article proposes a distinction between scientific knowledge, sophism, scholastics and pragmatism. By applying this framework to management research methods, it shows that hermeneutic-historical and research-action approaches have some legitimacy in opposition to those methods based on passing trends or that degenerate into scholasticism. The second part illustrates the conceptual framework based on the particular case of accounting history. Its intellectual value is underlined as well as its contribution to the creation of new systems and to denouncing those based on sophism. We then warn of the risks facing this discipline should it ever fall into introspection and neglect and the impact it should have on management practices. The authors present a series of proposals for avoiding yielding to scholastics.