As an extension of the Panel session held at the seventh Accounting History International Conference (7AHIC) in Seville in September 2013, the pressures, issues, strategies and implications of the movement from regional to international in terms of publishing in accounting history are presented. These dimensions are analysed from the point of view of four European countries: France, Italy, Portugal and Spain. Although these four countries have languages well disseminated around the globe, and/or possess a long history and tradition of discoveries and were strong players in commercial trade for centuries, academic publishing internationally is dominated by Anglo-Saxon countries and journals. Therefore, English is the main language and different challenges and hindrances are faced by researchers whose native language is other than English. More than arguing for a radical move from the regional to the international, a call is made for a more cooperative environment within international accounting history research which takes into account the cultural differences and embraces those differences.

The success of accounting history research has been evident through its recognition in the broader accounting literature in the 1990s. On this basis, we would expect that research in accounting history should display patterns of publication in generalist journals that are similar to those for other accounting research. However, we do not find such a similarity. First, accounting history has a relatively limited presence in generalist journals. Second, in the UK an elite group apparently controls accounting history research. Finally, there is cause to question the supposedly “local” nature of premier accounting journals in the US and the “international” nature of such journals in the UK.

New perspectives in accounting history have uncovered previously unattended relations between accounting and government. Earlier Foucauldian analyses of governments have not explained sufficiently the relations of accounting practices to governmental discourses in order to manage populations.This work uses the governmentality frame to analyse the role of accounting in two organizations located in the south of Spain in the second half of the eighteenth century: the New Settlements of Sierra Morena and Andalucia (NSs) and the Royal Tobacco Factory of Seville (RTFS). The period studied is remarkable because it was the apogee of the Enlightenment in Spain. From the standpoint of government, this period facilitated a new way to manage populations. The present work has drawn on Foucault's concept of governmentality in order to discover how accounting worked in two government-supported organizations independently of the discourses that pervaded each one. Drawing on the reticulation of the space, the use of rules and accounting from the governmental perspective, we analyse those institutions.The article concludes that the reticulation of space is an essential apparatus to exert action at a distance; the rules are a type of government technology; and, overall, accounting is a practice for the mastery of the population independently from the discourse of the institution.New perspectives in accounting history have uncovered previously unattended relations between accounting, society and government (e.g., Miller, 1986;Hopper and Armstrong, 1991;Stewart, 1992;Ezzamel, 1997; Fleischman J uan B años S ánchez -M atamoros is a Lecturer in Accounting, F ernando G utiérrez H idalgo an Assistrant Professor, and C oncha Á lvarez -D ardet E spejo (mcalvesp@dee.upo.es) and F rancisco C arrasco F enech Professors of Accounting at the University Pablo de Olavide of Seville. This research has benefited from financial support (in part) by SEC2633-2001 and SEJ-0111. The authors are also grateful to two anonymous referees for their constructive comments.

El trabajo presenta un conjunto de hechos significativos que han marcado la evolución histórica de la contabilidad de costes y gestión en los últimos 120 años (1885-2005) siguiendo a autores de reconocido prestigio como Horngren (1982), Kaplan (1984) y Johnson y Kaplan (1988). Sin embargo, esta descripción no pretende ser exhaustiva, sino que por el contrario, se puede ampliar con estudios más profundos y específicos relativos apaíses y periodos concretos. Como resumen, se puede decir que la contabilidad de gestión ha evolucionado acompasada con los cambios en los entornos productivos y organizativos de las empresas.A pesar de que desde que tenemos noticias de la existencia del hombre ha habido alguna evidencia de cálculo económico, hay que esperar hasta la Edad Moderna, y sobre todo al último cuarto del siglo XIX, para encontrar asignaciones regulares de los costes indirectos a los productos y evidencias de la utilización de indicadores de gestión de forma continuada.Asimismo, se ha visto que durante los primeros años del siglo XX hubo un periodo de evolución significativa en la contabilidad de gestión como consecuencia de la aparición del Movimiento de la Dirección Científica del Trabajo encabezado por Taylor. El primer cuarto del siglo XX supuso también un impulso en la contabilidad de gestión, como consecuencia de la creación de empresas multinacionales que propiciaron la aparición de indicadores nuevos para la asignación de recursos.Sin embargo, según Johnson y Kaplan (1988), a partir de la tercera década del siglo XX, y hasta los años ochenta, no ha habido una evolución significativa debido, sobre todo, a la preponderancia de los estados financieros. No obstante, Horngren (1982) no ve el periodo de una forma uniforme e identifica tres etapas en esta evolución.Un punto de inflexión en esta evolución han sido los cambios tecnológicos y organizativos ocurridos durante la década de los ochenta. Éstos han supuesto que, durante la última década del siglo XX y los primeros años del siglo XXI, la contabilidad de costes y gestión haya recobrado un nuevo vigor tanto en la investigación como en la práctica. En todo caso, la presentación lineal con la que se han expuesto aquí los hechos, no quiere decir que sea única. Es más, la diversidad de aproximaciones a los hechos históricos, ha supuesto el resurgir investigador de la última década. En todo caso, coincidimos con Hernández Esteve (1996) en el sentido de que la investigación histórica se debe sustentar en fuentes primarias.

Most accounting literature based on the Foucauldian frame has explained the role of accounting in the imposition of a governmental programme over a population, without considering the consequences in terms of resistance. This paper analyses the state power exerted over populations by means of accounting and also the role of accounting in cases of contestation and resistance towards the various agents of government. To this end, we have studied the enactment, implementation and fall of the Instrucción de Intendentes ( Instruction for Intendants) of 1718 in Spain, the roles of the different actors involved, and how accounting was used to defend these conceptions. The change in government by means of accounting is an example of what Foucault identified as the dynamic of discourses.