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PurposeThe purpose of this study is to contribute to the research related to “the interplay between accounting and the state, politics, and local authorities in the broad government and administration of food for sustainability of populations” (Sargiacomo et al., 2016). Considering contemporary examples and investigating the genealogy of an 18th-century reform of fishery management (the New Plan), the authors explore the role played by accounting and calculative practices when local authorities intervene using forms of discipline based on control systems that acted on commons (fish), people and space.Design/methodology/approachThis paper is historically grounded on archival research on a fish provisioning case during the 18th century in Ancona, an Italian town on the Adriatic coast. The investigation adopts an approach focussed on the use of disciplinary methods in the terms highlighted by Foucault. This perspective offers a lens capable of revealing the key role of accounting in a period when discipline became “general formulas of domination” (Foucault, 1977) and the Papal States were looking for food provisioning solutions (Foucault, 2007). The study highlights similarities with contemporary fishery management.FindingsThe paper shows that governability of fishery in a commons' logic is not limited by the properties of the good, but rather “it is achieved through the objects and instruments that are deployed to make it possible” (Johnsen, 2014, p. 429). It reveals forms assumed by economic calculation in different eras and their contribution in the art of governing realised by the state (Hoskin and Macve, 2016). The study unveils how accounting effectively operates using “naming and counting” activities (Ezzamel and Hoskin, 2002) based on a system of documents and accounting registers; these have a pivotal role in redefining fishery management and in keeping goods (fish) and people (fishermen) under control. The investigation also highlights the importance of properly quantifying data in fishery management, confirming the literature on the topic (Beddington et al., 2007, p. 1713). In contemporary situations, data refer to quantifying the fish stock in the sea and the consequent estimation of fish catch. In the historical investigation, although environmental protection was not an issue, quantification refers to the fish that entered the town of Ancona, whose estimation was the result of a new calculative approach adopted by local authorities facing fish needs. In addition, it offers early evidence of organised and rational-based control mechanisms that were the result of Enlightened ideas emerging in the Papal States context.Originality/valueDespite the fact that fish represent a fundamental good for governments to act on in response to a population's needs, there has been no attention paid to how governmental authorities have used disciplinary mechanisms to intervene in fishery management or the role played by accounting. This study's novelty is its investigation of fishery, using Foucauldian disciplinary methods to understand accounting's contribution in fishery governance. In addition, this investigation permits to unveil the role of accounting to support one of the main principles of the governance of commons that is represented by the congruence between rules and local conditions (Fennell, 2011, p. 11; Ostrom, 1990, p. 92).

This archival research aims to explore the role of accounting for natural disasters. It is focused on the 1966 Florence flood. Considering the role of Florence in the worldwide cultural context, our attention is focused on the cultural patrimony in the Florence State Archive and on the role that accounting and accountability had in its rescue. The work refers to Foucault's and Derrida's concept of the archive and draws on the notion of accounting as ‘naming and counting’ practices. The investigation highlights the pivotal role of accounting in the rescue process of archival documents. Using ‘naming and counting’ practices, the damaged documentation was identified and inventoried and the accountability activities offered researchers knowledge of historical documents not available for investigation. These accounting practices realised the exercise of the power of re-‘consignation’ permitting an invaluable cultural patrimony to be re-consigned to the community.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of performance measurement systems as technologies of government in the operationalisation of smart city programmes. It answers the research question: how do the development and use of performance measurement systems support smart cities in the achievement of their goals? Design/methodology/approach This paper presents a longitudinal case study that uses an interventionist approach to investigate the possibilities and limitations of the use of performance measurement systems as technologies of government in a smart city. Interpretations are theoretically informed by the Foucauldian governmentality framework (Foucault, 2009) and by public sector performance measurement literature. Findings The findings address the benefits and criticalities confronting a smart city that introduces new performance measurement systems as a technology of government. Such technologies become problematic tools when the city network is characterised by a fragmentation of inter-departmental processes, and when forms of resistance emerge due to a lack of process owners, horizontal accountability and cooperation among involved parties. Research limitations/implications This paper is based on a case study of a single smart city, and outlines the need for both comparative and multidisciplinary analyses in order to analyse the causes and effects of smart city challenges. Originality/value This paper offers a critical understanding of the role of accounting in the smart city. The ineffectiveness of performance measurement systems is related to the multiple roles of such technologies of government, which may lead to a temporary paralysis in the achievement of smart city goals and programmes.

This study offers an analysis of published historical research on accounting for natural disasters. Drawing on the insights provided by an examination of 35 accounting/business/economic history and generalist journals, 11 articles have been selected and analysed. The analysis conducted on the scattered literature identified the emerging themes, disasters investigated, periods of time explored and main contributions of published research. The analysis is extended by the examination of some key conferences of interdisciplinary history associations, and of the eventual journals/issues where the papers presented were published. The investigation has also been complemented by a brief selection of books showing historical analyses of diverse disasters, typologies and periods of investigation. The stimuli provided by the study have helped to portray the main features of an open research agenda, highlighting possible future research topics and suggesting ancient and recent disasters’ loci to be investigated worldwide.

The paper presents an overview on contributions referred to charities in a historical perspective. In particular, it is underlined the role assumed by different forms of accounting and accountability adopted in various charitable organisations considering different context and experiences (Italy, Uk, USA, Australia and New Zealand).

This chapter seeks to portray the life, principal writings and contribution to accounting education and accounting history dissemination of Fabio Besta, an eminent scholar of Ca'Foscari, where he worked for more than forty years. It aims to augment biographical studies in accounting history, given that, admittedly, they have been rather neglected by accounting and accounting history academia. The chapter seeks to highlight the contribution of Fabio Besta in the educational field related to the origins of double-entry bookkeeping, prior to Pacioli's articulation of the technique and its rules. It offers a brief overview of the socio-economic scenario at the time Besta was writing. The chapter illustrates the equity-based accounting system (sistema patrimoniale) proposed by Besta, and then unveils its impact on accounting theory, thereby elucidating his profile as an accounting thinker. Besta was an eminent scholar who contributed to the development of accounting education in Italy and its tradition of accounting history scholarship.

In 1992, a political earthquake shook Italy when the corruption and fraud case, “Clean Hands” (“Mani Pulite”) exploded into the public eye, and a vast network of corrupt politicians, businessmen and bureaucrats was unveiled. The Italian bureaucratic apparatus was especially implicated in this expose, and it became evident that government procurement practices were shaped by an organizational culture of corruption. This paper develops a critical longitudinal analysis of the subsequent 22-year period to critically assess whether the subsequent introduction of accounting-based anti-corruption assemblages helped to curb corrupt behaviors.

The cereals’ provisioning of towns has always represented a constant preoccupation for rulers and accounting has played a fundamental role in the achievement of the related political aims. In this scenario, the paper explores the case of Bergamo, during the period of the Venetian domination, considering the XVI-XVII centuries. The control on cereals, exercised by a specific body (Cereals Board), is explored adopting the Foucaldian “governmentality”. In the light of this framework, the contribution unveils how accounting operated in its role of technology of government offering the Municipality a macro and micro-knowledge for reshaping actions (Lemke, 2001).

This paper seeks to reveal Fabio Besta (1845–1922) as an important accounting thinker. It attempts to underline his influence on accounting theory, and highlight his major impact on the development of accounting history knowledge. It is shown that Besta, through his accounting thought, founded on a value-based theory and an equity-centred accounting system (sistema patrimoniale), facilitated the shift from a personalistic to a non-personalistic, or materialistic, theory of accounts. It is suggested that Besta's La Ragioneria is a milestone in accounting history. In this work he anticipated the adoption of a comparative international approach to accounting history research, particularly in relation to the exploration of pre-Pacioli double-entry bookkeeping. His work was also important to the dissemination of knowledge about early double-entry bookkeeping practices, and thereby encouraged further investigations by the accounting history community.

This paper analyses the development of Economia Aziendale as a peculiar Italian theoretical construct, arguing that the current model — at least since Zappa’s ideas of 1927 — is not compatible with Italian practice, nor with the largely successful efforts of the legal profession to stifle government attempts to increase flexibility and relevance. More precisely, two key research questions are addressed. First, is the strong theoretical tradition of Economia Aziendale consistent with the prevalent adoption of the historical cost principle in Italian financial accounting in the twentieth century? Second, how has the historical cost principle achieved this prevalence? We show that the theoretical tradition is clearly inconsistent with the prevalence of the historical cost principle, and provide a coherent rationale explaining this outcome.

Purpose – Within the interface between power and charity, the purpose of this paper is to enhance an understanding of the role of charities in the administration of poor in local government and to explore how accounting operates in such a context. In this investigation, the paper considers accounting, referring to both financial and non-financial information, inserted in a complex of technologies accomplishing the “government of poverty”. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is based on a historical study referring to the case of MIA, an Italian charity, investigated during the sixteenth-seventeenth centuries, adopting Foucault's “governmentality” framework in a diachronic perspective. This approach, coordinating views coming from Anglo-Foucauldian scholars with alternative Foucault effects expressed in Dean's works, represents a novelty of this investigation. Findings – The paper shows the interface of power (municipality) and charity (MIA) in the “government of poverty”, in a context of ancien regime, pointing out how this interplay was a key element within the “discourse of poor”. The pivotal function of MIA as an “agency of police” and the constitutive role of accounting as a technology of “government of poverty”, representing a social practice able to allow the preservation of the social equilibrium, emerge. Research limitations/implications – The research is based on a single case study and it shows the need for both comparative and interdisciplinary analysis in order to increase an understanding of the interface of power and charity in ancien regime contexts, as well as in contemporary situations of crisis or emergencies. Originality/value – For the first time in the accounting history literature, the work presents an extension of “governmentality” analysis into the domain of the “government of poor” through a series of Municipality Orders and their operationalisation by a charity, which adopted accounting to realise a control on people and resources contributing to reach local government equilibrium aims. The work also offers a reference within the contemporary accounting literature in relation to the debate about the role of charities or similar non-profit organizations in the context of the current financial crisis affecting the world, or in situations of emergencies.

Accounting and the conscious secretive killing of humans are rarely concurrently examined in the contemporary and historical literature. Based on examinations of a rare and formerly highly secretive surviving written record found in the Venice State Archive, and other surviving primary records, as well as secondary sources, this novel study outlines evidence of “accounting for killing” of the enemies of the Venetian State during the sixteenth century as a means of rendering the individuals who made those decisions “accountable for death”. The rationale for this governmental approach to self-preservation, described as “Reason of State”, was widely adopted in Europe during this period. The available evidence illustrates the use of the police apparatus in the Venetian State, namely the Council of Ten, in order to reinforce, protect and defend the State, and illuminates the role of accounting information in this highly secretive and sinister process. The notion of “secretive collective internal horizontal accountability” is applied in explaining the accountability for death regime found to have been adopted, thus broadening the dimensions of accountability that are typically recognized within the accounting literature. Rarely has accounting and accountability within government been shown to be so secretive.