Business Commons^™

Knowing More As Knowing Less? Alternative Histories Of Cost And Management Accounting In The U.S. And The U.K., Keith W. Hoskin, Richard Macve

Accounting Historians Journal

In attempting to understand the genesis and scope of mod­ern cost and management accounting systems, accounting histori­ans adopting what has been labeled a Foucauldian approach have been rewriting the history of key 18th and 19th century develop­ments in the U.K. and U.S. through new evidence, new interpreta­tion, and a refocusing of attention on familiar events. This is a disciplinary history which sees modern cost and management ac­counting as articulating a new kind of expert disciplinary knowl­edge, as well as exercising a disciplinary power, in the construc­tion of a new human accountability. However, this disciplinary view has been challenged by more …