Looking for an Accounting Identity : The Case of Romania during the 20th Century

This article aims to provide a longitudinal presentation of developments in Romanian accounting during the 20th century and to propose a neo-institutional explanation of this evolution. The historical research methodology employed here is complex. We use a constructive research philosophy, an inductive research approach, a mixture of research types (narrative, oral and interpretative histories), content analysis as our research method and four types of data collection (archives, secondary data, observations and interviews). The interpretative analysis is based on the neo-institutional theoretical framework. The study identifies a “homeAgrown”, normative influence in Romanian accounting practices during the first 50 years of the twentieth century, a coercive one, imposed until 1989, by a centralized communist system, and from 1989 to the present, a mixed isomorphism oriented around French, European and International accounting systems. Lacking a period of introspection, the authors feel that there is little hope that Romanian accounting will reA discover its unique culture, or will manage to build upon or improve its indigenous base in the current international contextAccounting ; Historical approach ; Neo-institutionalism ; XXth century ; Romania