Unpacking dialogic accounting: a systematic literature review and research agenda

Abstract

PurposeThis article aims to contribute to the critical accounting literature by reviewing how previous studies have addressed the topic of dialogic accounting (DA), examining the main themes investigated and discussing potential further developments of the DA research agenda.Design/methodology/approachThe present study builds on a systematic literature review of 186 research products indexed on Scopus, Web of Science and Google Scholar that were published between 2004 and 2019 in 55 accounting or non-accounting scientific journals and 14 books.FindingsFirst, a content analysis of each contribution informs a classification in terms of research design, methodology, geographical setting and sector of analysis. Second, a bibliometric analysis provides several visual representations of the network of research products included in our review using bibliographic coupling, cooccurrence and coauthorship analyses. Third, and most importantly, the main narrative review discusses the development of the research strand on DA from the seminal works that introduced the topic, through the core of critical contributions inspired by the struggle between democracy and agonism, to the most recent contributions, in which new topics emerge and innovative methodologies are applied to the study of DA.Originality/valueThe main contribution of this manuscript is twofold. In addition to providing a systematic, bibliometric and narrative review of the evolution of nearly two decades of literature on DA, the present study is intended to collect ideas for further research and to discuss how the advent of new technologies and the peculiarities of various institutional contexts can shape the future research agenda on this critical form of accounting.

Artificial intelligence based decision-making in accounting and auditing: ethical challenges and normative thinking

“…An interesting perspective for future theoretical research in this area can also be found in the calls for a more dialogic accounting (DA), following for example Manetti et al . (2021).…”

“…An interesting perspective for future theoretical research in this area can also be found in the calls for a more dialogic accounting (DA), following for example Manetti et al (2021). True to the (necessary) interdisciplinary and critical nature of research into the ethical decisionmaking in future scenarios of human-machine collaboration, it seems prudent to rethink the nature of accounting information as a whole.…”

Blockchain in accounting practice and research: systematic literature review

“…In our analysis of the citations of the examined publications, we used bibliographic coupling using VOSviewer software. Bibliographic coupling involves measuring the similarity between two publications by identifying the number of references that they share (Manetti et al , 2021). The sizes of the dots associated with each node represent weights defined by the number of citations made by each publication.…”

Consulting on the European Union's 2050 tourism policies: An appreciative inquiry materiality assessment

“…Academics call for more deliberative stakeholder consultations (Mio et al, 2020). Yet, critical dialogic accounting is an emergent field of research (Manetti et al, 2021) and it remains in a conceptual stage with regards to materiality (e.g., Puroila & Mäkelä, 2019).…”