Dear EAA Members, EAR Readers, Authors and Reviewers and Members of the Academic Accounting Community,
At the beginning of 2024, Beatriz García Osma handed the Editorship of the European Accounting Review (EAR) over to us. We are writing to express our sincere gratitude and enthusiasm as we embark on this exciting journey as the new co-editors of the European Accounting Review.
We would like to begin by thanking Beatriz García Osma for her leadership over her tenure 2020-2023, as she has successfully guided the journal through a global pandemic and continued to develop the EAR as a highly regarded and well-respected publication outlet for high-quality accounting research in the academic community. We have already benefitted greatly from Bea’s experience and kind guidance as we are taking our first steps at the helm of the EAR. We would also like to thank the EAA Publications Committee and EAA Management Committee for entrusting us with the responsibility and opportunity to contribute to the advancement of scholarship in our field.
1. Editorial Practice
The committees’ decision to choose two co-editors, who couldn’t be more different in their methodological approach to accounting research, is a testament of the journal’s openness to the diversity of thought, methodologies, paradigms, sub-fields and approaches to accounting research. Something we, as editors, are committed to uphold and promote throughout our tenure.
We consider ourselves lucky to have the support of a tremendously experienced and talented team of associated editors and editorial board members. Without their dedication and outstanding scholarship the journal would not be where it is today: A highly desired outlet for innovative and impactful accounting research of the highest academic standard. In continuation with past practice our associate editor team will have autonomy over editorial decisions of manuscripts that we hand over to them for consideration. To support their decisions, they will typically seek the assessment of two referees on each manuscript.
A quick glance at the journal statistics reveals that a substantial number of manuscripts have been desk rejected in the past without being sent out to referees for further review. We expect this trend to continue under our tenure. Desk rejections, as painful as they are, are not meant to dishearten authors but rather to allow them to benefit from a quick turnaround in cases where we deem it unlikely that the manuscript will successfully withstand the scrutiny of the editorial and review process. This expedited process also serves to reduce the strain on our associate editors’ already busy workload for the journal and to protect our reviewers’ time, on whose dedication to the journal we depend. In return, we strive to guide manuscripts that make the first cut through the review process in a timely and constructive manner. This also includes an intention to avoid having manuscripts go through multiple rounds of reviews over an extended period of time, which we know, also from personal experience, that authors are not particularly fond of. Therefore, we seek in most cases to come to a decision after two rounds of reviews, although we acknowledge that some processes are tricky and hence at times the Editor needs further rounds to be in a position to make the call on a given submission.
2. Young Scholars Track
The European Accounting Review continues to be committed to the next generation of emerging scholars in accounting. As such, we encourage PhD students and non-tenured faculty early in their career to submit their work to the Young Scholars Track. We aim to provide papers submitted to the Young Scholars track with more extensive feedback and guidance than regular submission. Specifically, associate editors and reviewers will aim to clearly explain what is needed to be successful on the path to publication or where we see no realistic path, what the main issues are and why the paper cannot be published. As a community we owe a particular duty to our young scholars to help them become successful accounting researchers. At the same time, it should perhaps be emphasized that the Young Scholars Track is not about providing a fast track to acceptance; all submissions to the Young Scholars Track are expected to meet similar thresholds prior to acceptance as regular submissions do.
3. Open Science and Registered Reports sections
As Editors we consider transparent research practices to be one of the backbones of trustworthy scholarship. At the same time, we acknowledge the concerns that have been raised with regards to potential and actual barriers for sharing, for instance, the data and code used in research with others in the public domain. Hence, the European Accounting Review continues to promote research that is based on Open Science principles, which in simple terms refers to practicing science in such a way that others can collaborate and contribute, and our Open Science Section continues to welcome research which complies with the Open Science principles. Research submitted to this section should be based on data that is findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable (FAIR). Commercially licensed data, which many scholars use in their work, can also qualify as FAIR as long as the authors provide reproducible code which can be used to obtain the data. Moreover, all applied methods should be clearly communicated, as this allows other researchers to reproduce the findings. A typical way to do so is to openly provide the program code. In addition to the actual findings of the study, in the Open Science Section, the data and code used in the submission will also be assessed as potential separate contributions to the literature. The European Accounting Review Open Science Section is open to all topics and methods, including work that is mostly methodological in nature.
Our other dedicated section, Registered Reports, relates to the tendency of scholarly research to be conservative in nature. It has often been noted how researchers may have limited incentives to engage in innovative research designs and data collection processes, as in a regular submission process the eventual findings and research results tend to play a major role as it comes to the potential contribution of a given study. In other words, pursuing novelty and different datasets can be considered too risky and hence avoided. In seeking to promote innovative and different research requiring the collection of new datasets, EAR continues to offer scholars an opportunity to submit their work to the Registered Reports section of the journal. This section is most likely particularly fitting for experimental studies and for studies that require substantial upfront investments in terms of data collection, as authors can confidently progress with their plan without being concerned that all the effort put into developing and executing the study would be in vain only if the results would not show support to the expected hypothesis.
Submissions to this section follow a two-stage review process. The first stage requires a research proposal containing a motivated research question, clearly characterizing the potential contribution of the proposed study and a detailed outline of the research design. This research proposal will be reviewed using the normal review process. In the case where (a potentially revised version of) the research proposal is accepted, and the actual research is carried out according to the accepted proposal, the final study will only be reviewed for expositional clarity but not for contribution and implementation. We encourage scholars considering submission to the Registered Reports section to be in touch with the Editors to discuss the process in advance.
4. Ethics in Accounting Research
Ethics in accounting research and publishing is of paramount importance to us, particularly in light of recent challenges facing the academic community. According to data from Retraction Watch, there have been close to 500 paper retractions of accounting and accounting-related papers - a concerning trend. Recent news reports also highlight rising cases of plagiarism within the academic community, underscoring the urgency of upholding integrity in research and publishing. The advent of AI and large language models, while creating tremendous opportunities, will further pose challenges for the editorial process. As editors we are deeply committed to addressing these challenges head-on by maintaining the highest ethical standards throughout the publication process of EAR. This commitment involves not only adhering to established ethical guidelines, many of which our predecessors have written on, but also actively implementing measures to prevent plagiarism, data manipulation, and any other form of academic misconduct. Upholding ethical standards is not just a professional obligation; it is an imperative step towards ensuring the continued credibility and impact of our journal, and the academic profession more generally, against the backdrop of growing scepticism towards academic research.
Note: To highlight the opportunities and challenges of generative AI, this section has been – with minor modifications – written by a large language model.
5. Past Associate Editors, Editorial Board and Reviewers
Together with Beatriz García Osma, as the Editors of the European Accounting Review we wish to acknowledge and thank the scholars who served as Associate Editors or Editorial Board Members in 2023. Without their help, European Accounting Review could not fulfil its mission.
In addition to the Editors, Associate Editors and Editorial Board Members listed at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?show=editorialBoard&journalCode=rear20, we recognize and celebrate all the scholars listed in the appendix for their invaluable contributions.
6. Conclusions
As we noted above, we are beginning our tenure at a point when EAR is considered a highly regarded and well-respected publication outlet in the academic accounting community. The journal has reached this position due to the hard work of past EAR Editors and the broader EAR community. Moreover, we should also bear in mind the fact that EAR is the journal of the European Accounting Association, and as such the Editors are also stewards of the institutional status the journal has gained over the past three decades. Overall, we aim at developing EAR on its current trajectory. This does not mean that we would be standing still. The context, both within and beyond academia, is evolving swiftly, and presenting us with opportunities and challenges going forward, with the questions related to large language models serving as an example. Another example of critical contemporary importance would be the (un)sustainability of the current social and economic systems, with related challenges increasingly being recognized to be at the core of accountancy going forward. We anticipate these themes to be prominent amongst the submissions we receive at EAR in the coming years.
Finally, we want to return to openness, diversity and flexibility, which stand at heart of EAR’s aims and scope. The appointment of two editors with very different approaches to accounting research signals how EAR is open to all paradigms of accounting research. This was also one of the principles we followed in building our Editorial Team, on which we are lucky to have scholarly experts from a range of methodological approaches and research paradigms. There is, however, only so much we as Editors can do in making sure that EAR publishes diverse work, as we can only consider those submissions we receive. In other words, if you felt that your area, be that accounting history, discourse analysis, financial accounting theory or qualitative management accounting, is underrepresented in EAR, do consider submitting your best work to us. We promise to give it a fair consideration, and should the work withstand the scrutiny of the review process, we are happy to publish insightful and rigorous papers contributing substantially to our knowledge of accounting, no matter which paradigm or topic area the paper is exploring.
In conclusion, we are excited to take on the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. We are grateful to our authors, associate editors, reviewers, and the wider EAR community for their ongoing support of the journal and look forward to working with each of you to ensure that EAR continues its path to become the journal of choice for innovative and impactful accounting research.
Appendix
List of Past Associate Editors, Ad-Hoc Associate Editors and Guest Editors
The Editors of the European Accounting Review wish to acknowledge and thank the following scholars, who contributed their time to handle manuscripts as Associate Editors, ad-hoc Associate Editors or Special Issue Guest Editors in 2023.
Full List of Reviewers
The Editors and Associate Editors of European Accounting Review wish to acknowledge and thank the following 461 scholars, who have contributed their time to review manuscripts in 2023.
Without their help, European Accounting Review could not fulfil its mission.