Organizations and Markets

Accounting: A Brief History

| Peter Klein |

Despite widespread rumors to the contrary, we agree with Monty Python that accounting is not boring. After all, Ludwig von Mises was fond of quoting Goethe’s remark that double-entry bookkeeping was “one of the finest inventions of the human mind.” Who can disagree?

In this spirit, I’d like to share a terrific bibliography on the history of accounting provided by Sudha Shenoy, responding to a listserv query on the “organic” emergence of accounting practice. Someone asked whether accounting conventions can be interpreted as a kind of “spontaneous order,” in Hayek’s sense, or if the standard rules are the result mainly of state intervention. Sudha replied with these reading suggestions (lightly edited by me): (more…)

9 March 2007 at 12:39 am Peter G. Klein 5 comments