Neopatrimonialism, good governance, corruption and accounting in Africa

Trevor Hopper

Journal of Accounting in Emerging Economies, 2017, vol. 7, issue 2, 225-248

Abstract: Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to reflect on how best to design, implement and assess accounting reforms in Africa. Design/methodology/approach - A cross-disciplinary literature review. Findings - Whilst neopatrimonialism inhibits optimal development, some forms do not block it. Such governance often permeates African politics and reforms directed at its elimination may fail due to a lack of political will. Thus accounting reforms should recognize their political feasibility and be directed at areas congruent with strengthening attributes of a developmental state. Research limitations/implications - There is a need to evaluate accounting reforms with respect to the level of a country’s development, relate them to its political governance, and evaluate them with respect to incremental rather than absolute achievement of their aims. Practical implications - Rather than relying on imported “best practice” accounting standards and systems, there is a need for greater indigenous involvement to create systems that meet local needs and circumstances to increase indigenous accounting capacity and will to reform. Social implications - Whilst the push to good governance is a desirable ideal, reforms need to be pragmatic with respect to feasibility. Originality/value - The paper relates recent work on development to accounting reform in Africa which has been neglected by accounting scholars and practitioners.

Keywords: Corruption; Accounting; Good governance; African politics; Neopatrimonialism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (text/html)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:jaeepp:jaee-12-2015-0086

DOI: 10.1108/JAEE-12-2015-0086

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Accounting in Emerging Economies is currently edited by Dr Shahzad Uddin

More articles in Journal of Accounting in Emerging Economies from Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Emerald Support ().