Examining how charity accounting evolved in the UK from the profession's point of view.

What is it about?

Professions enjoy privileged positions and expend efforts to sustain these in public and interprofessional domains. This research investigates a previously vacant and largely uncontested jurisdiction in the UK charity sector that was claimed, maintained and subsequently expanded by the accountancy profession. We find that the dominant involvement of the accountancy profession leads to a charity regulatory framework that centralises the giving of an account. Over time, the accountancy profession advances highly specialised charity accounting and novel disclosures in annual reports. The study contributes to a deeper understanding of professions expanding jurisdiction in the absence of competition. In our conclusions, we scrutinise implications for trust and legitimacy in the UK charity sector, balancing increased information demand on charities with accessibility to users.

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Why is it important?

We use both Abbott’s (1988) system of professions and institutional work from Lawrence & Suddaby (2006) that enables us to extend prior research highlighting the reciprocal dynamics between processes of institutionalisation and processes of professionalisation. Thus, this enables a merging of the macro-level professional literature with a micro-level of study - the UK charity regulatory framework, specifically its reporting requirements. These developments were relatively non-conflictual and involved high use of social capital - the UK system is held in high regard internationally so it is a model that can have learnings for others.

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