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Garry Carnegie recently concluded that 'the key development in accounting historiography between 1983 and 2012 has been the advent of new accounting history'. We agree and believe that the debate in accounting reflects a greater debate between postmodern and traditional historians - one which questions both the nature of historiography and the historian's role in society. As a participant in this debate, Michael Gaffikin criticized traditionalists (in accounting) for failing to assess developments in the general history literature. This article responds to Gaffikin's critique. We initially describe the key issues in the debate between postmodern and traditional historians. We review the current general history literature and then recount how the debate played out in three distinct episodes in accounting historiography in which the authors directly participated. We conclude by assessing the current state of accounting historiography.

Accelerating threats to a sustainable relationship between economic growth and the capacity of the global social‐ecological system to support it require that the implications of competitiveness be reassessed. Today, the capacities that underlie economic competitiveness must also be brought to bear on policy and pedagogy to prepare the coming generation to face an unprecedented and dangerous global future. This article argues that the bureaucratic ‘industrial’, standards‐driven model of schooling currently fails to release the talents of students either for the competitiveness or collaboration that will be crucial in facing the demands of the decades ahead. It argues for policies, schools and pedagogies that promote creativity and a human capacity for innovation, not the relentless pursuit of externally imposed measurable standards. The types of necessary learning experiences are explored and examples are provided of principles and practices that teachers and schools need to develop further. Education for economic competitiveness on one hand and education for sustainable development on the other both require similar open minds, creative skills and teaching methods to prepare students for the transformations and innovations ahead. In answering the question ‘what do competitiveness and sustainable development require from schools and teachers?’ we conclude that most elements of appropriate pedagogies are available but they need to be extended. Managing their extension on a large scale to transform complex education systems is a major challenge for policy‐makers and educators at all levels.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to focus on the labour contract system (LCS) established by the Freedmen’s Bureau after the American Civil War to normalise relations between freed-slaves and their former masters and to uphold their rights as free citizens. In particular, it explains the lack of accountability of employers under the LCS and how this contributed to the system’s failure.Design/methodology/approachThe paper adopts an archive-based approach to develop and illustrate the labour contracting relationship between freed-persons and property owners and the role accounting played in sustaining this relationship in the immediate post-bellum period.FindingsThe paper finds that the LCS was coercive compared to contemporary business practice in the USA; did not conform to the high ideals of contracting as portrayed by the abolition movement; and was adopted by default rather than design. In the event, the reluctance of the federal government to infringe individual autonomy by imposing an over-arching system of regulation to hold employers to account for upholding their contractual obligations prevailed over the desire to defend the freed-people’s property rights.Research limitations/implicationsThis research examines the relationship between labour contracting and property rights as well as the role of accounting in sustaining racial prejudice against freed-persons after the American Civil War. As in many archive-based studies, illustrations are selective and not randomised.Originality/valueThe paper examines the various accountings and accountabilities within the LCS in the context of the underlying ideological tensions and priorities in post-conflict US society.

The paper analyzes the decision of the FASB and IASB not to treat the motivational and control aspects of stewardship as a separate and distinct reporting objective to that of facilitating investment decisions. It does so first by considering the demand for information to control agents, and second by assessing the capacity of decision-useful information to replicate stewardship effects. The paper finds an essence to accounting based on the legal protection of property rights, encompassing stewardship, which has remained constant since earliest times. The decision taken by the boards on stewardship also appears disconnected from changes in the capital markets, as well as the writings on reporting objectives that preceded it.

The paper describes and discusses the work done in producing the first geological maps of the world–by Ami Boue (1843) and Jules Marcou (1861)–and their later editions. Boue had a remarkably wide knowledge of geology through his own field investigations and his vast knowledge of the geological literature. The same may be said of Marcou. But their approaches to 'global mapping' were very different. Boue was greatly influenced by Elie de Beaumont and also the idea that geographical knowledge could in itself facilitate the formulation of geological hypotheses and make possible producing geological maps for areas that had not yet been examined by geologists. He did, however, also make use, where possible, of written reports of areas that he had not visited. He described his work as a priori mapping, with the use of analogical reasoning. Marcou's geological mapping likewise drew on his extremely extensive field experience and geological reading, but he did not colour in the parts of the globe for which he lacked any information. Coming eighteen years after Boue, there was inevitably more information available to Marcou. Their two efforts, procedures and results are examined for Australia and New Zealand, which neither of them ever visited. An attempt is made to identify the sources that each of them might have used. The paper provides reproductions of the maps that Boue and Marcou produced, and discusses the successes and failures of their enterprises.

The paper describes and discusses the work done in producing the first geological maps of the world—by Ami Boué (1843) and Jules Marcou (1861)—and their later editions. Boué had a remarkably wide knowledge of geology through his own field investigations and his vast knowledge of the geological literature. The same may be said of Marcou. But their approaches to 'global mapping' were very different. Boué was greatly influenced by Elie de Beaumont and also the idea that geographical knowledge could in itself facilitate the formulation of geological hypotheses and make possible producing geological maps for areas that had not yet been examined by geologists. He did, however, also make use, where possible, of written reports of areas that he had not visited. He described his work as a priori mapping, with the use of analogical reasoning. Marcou's geological mapping likewise drew on his extremely extensive field experience and geological reading, but he did not colour in the parts of the globe for which he lacked any information. Coming eighteen years after Boué, there was inevitably more information available to Marcou. Their two efforts, procedures and results are examined for Australia and New Zealand, which neither of them ever visited. An attempt is made to identify the sources that each of them might have used. The paper provides reproductions of the maps that Boué and Marcou produced, and discusses the successes and failures of their enterprises.