Michael Power
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198296034
- eISBN:
- 9780191685187
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198296034.001.0001
- Subject:
- Business and Management, Finance, Accounting, and Banking, Organization Studies
Since the early 1980s there has been an explosion of auditing activity in the United Kingdom and North America. In addition to financial audits there are now medical audits, technology audits, value ...
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Since the early 1980s there has been an explosion of auditing activity in the United Kingdom and North America. In addition to financial audits there are now medical audits, technology audits, value for money audits, environmental audits, quality audits, teaching audits, and many others. Why has this happened? What does it mean when a society invests so heavily in an industry of checking and when more and more individuals find themselves subject to formal scrutiny? This book argues that the rise of auditing has its roots in political demands for accountability and control. At the heart of a new administrative style, internal control systems have begun to play an important public role and individual and organizational performance has been increasingly formalized and made auditable. The author argues that the new demands and expectations of audits live uneasily with their operational capabilities. Not only is the manner in which they produce assurance and accountability open to question but also, by imposing their own values, audits often have unintended and dysfunctional consequences for the audited organization.Less
Since the early 1980s there has been an explosion of auditing activity in the United Kingdom and North America. In addition to financial audits there are now medical audits, technology audits, value for money audits, environmental audits, quality audits, teaching audits, and many others. Why has this happened? What does it mean when a society invests so heavily in an industry of checking and when more and more individuals find themselves subject to formal scrutiny? This book argues that the rise of auditing has its roots in political demands for accountability and control. At the heart of a new administrative style, internal control systems have begun to play an important public role and individual and organizational performance has been increasingly formalized and made auditable. The author argues that the new demands and expectations of audits live uneasily with their operational capabilities. Not only is the manner in which they produce assurance and accountability open to question but also, by imposing their own values, audits often have unintended and dysfunctional consequences for the audited organization.
Michael Power
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198296034
- eISBN:
- 9780191685187
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198296034.003.0002
- Subject:
- Business and Management, Finance, Accounting, and Banking, Organization Studies
This chapter argues that, below the wealth of technical procedure, the epistemic foundation of financial auditing, i.e. the relation between its inputs and the production of assurance, is essentially ...
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This chapter argues that, below the wealth of technical procedure, the epistemic foundation of financial auditing, i.e. the relation between its inputs and the production of assurance, is essentially obscure. It specifically addresses the history of financial auditing. It also describes the uneasy and shifting relationship between audit practice and the programmatic goal of detecting fraud. It is noted that the history of audit practice is a history of attempts to deal with operational problems of inference subject to economic constraint. In addition, it is shown that financial auditing as a system remains strong. It also states an important lesson to carry forward from this chapter is that the audit process, for all its density of operational procedure, is interactive and judgemental.Less
This chapter argues that, below the wealth of technical procedure, the epistemic foundation of financial auditing, i.e. the relation between its inputs and the production of assurance, is essentially obscure. It specifically addresses the history of financial auditing. It also describes the uneasy and shifting relationship between audit practice and the programmatic goal of detecting fraud. It is noted that the history of audit practice is a history of attempts to deal with operational problems of inference subject to economic constraint. In addition, it is shown that financial auditing as a system remains strong. It also states an important lesson to carry forward from this chapter is that the audit process, for all its density of operational procedure, is interactive and judgemental.
George J. Benston, Michael Bromwich, Robert E. Litan, and Alfred Wagenhofer
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- February 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780195305838
- eISBN:
- 9780199783342
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195305833.003.0002
- Subject:
- Economics and Finance, Financial Economics
Investors, creditors, government officials, and others require information to evaluate companies’ economic position, performance, and prospects. This chapter examines the usefulness of financial ...
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Investors, creditors, government officials, and others require information to evaluate companies’ economic position, performance, and prospects. This chapter examines the usefulness of financial accounting statements and their limitations in providing this information, particularly measures of economic values. The essential features of the traditional market-transaction, cost-based accounting system, and the benefits and costs of fair-value accounting and of audits and attestations by independent public accountants (IPAs) are described and evaluated.Less
Investors, creditors, government officials, and others require information to evaluate companies’ economic position, performance, and prospects. This chapter examines the usefulness of financial accounting statements and their limitations in providing this information, particularly measures of economic values. The essential features of the traditional market-transaction, cost-based accounting system, and the benefits and costs of fair-value accounting and of audits and attestations by independent public accountants (IPAs) are described and evaluated.
Henk Addink
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780198841159
- eISBN:
- 9780191876653
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780198841159.003.0011
- Subject:
- Law, Constitutional and Administrative Law
This chapter explains the principle of accountability as part of the principles of good governance. The principle of accountability is already far beyond financial accounting, and it comes closer to ...
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This chapter explains the principle of accountability as part of the principles of good governance. The principle of accountability is already far beyond financial accounting, and it comes closer to the accountability of the minister in their relationship with the parliament and with the civil and criminal responsibility of persons and institutions in general.Less
This chapter explains the principle of accountability as part of the principles of good governance. The principle of accountability is already far beyond financial accounting, and it comes closer to the accountability of the minister in their relationship with the parliament and with the civil and criminal responsibility of persons and institutions in general.
