Does the Accounting Profession Discipline Its Members Differently After Public Scrutiny?

Devan Mescall, Fred Phillips and Regan N. Schmidt ()
Additional contact information
Devan Mescall: University of Saskatchewan
Fred Phillips: University of Saskatchewan
Regan N. Schmidt: University of Saskatchewan

Journal of Business Ethics, 2017, vol. 142, issue 2, No 10, 285-309

Abstract: Abstract This study examines how the accounting profession disciplines its members for professional misconduct in periods of increased public scrutiny. We conjecture and find that increased public scrutiny of the Canadian accounting profession, marked by the establishment of the Canadian Public Accountability Board in 2003, is positively associated with the severity of punitive sanctions administered by the profession’s disciplinary committees. We find that disciplinary committees are more likely to also demand rehabilitation outcomes and greater future monitoring for offenders. Finally, reporting of discipline outcomes has increased in outlets internal to the accounting profession, but not in publications targeted outside to the public. This latter finding is consistent with the private interest theoretical model of professional ethics developed by Parker (Acc Organ Soc 19:507–525, 1994) as evidence of a latent motivation of the profession to protect its professional private interests. Exploratory analyses indicate that punishment, rehabilitation, and reporting in external publications significantly influence whether offenders return to good standing.

Keywords: Punishment; Rehabilitation; Monitoring; Public interest; Private interest; CPAB (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10551-016-3156-0 Abstract (text/html)
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:kap:jbuset:v:142:y:2017:i:2:d:10.1007_s10551-016-3156-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... cs/journal/10551/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s10551-016-3156-0

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Business Ethics is currently edited by Michelle Greenwood and R. Edward Freeman

More articles in Journal of Business Ethics from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().