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This paper aims to highlight the importance of (public) value(s) and publicness in accounting and accountability research. It pinpoints a range of issues that scholars need to contemplate when reconsidering publicness in accounting research and practice.

The paper adopts an interdisciplinary literature review associated with a conceptual discussion of the actual and future challenges of public service accounting and accountability in considering public value(s).

The paper illustrates the centrality of (public) value(s) at the individual, organizational and societal levels in shaping and being shaped by calculative practices, and shows that looking at the interconnections between values and accounting is a fruitful research avenue. Moreover, it highlights the power of embracing interdisciplinary approaches to illuminate these interconnections and relate them to complex and current phenomena.

The paper’s originality lies in the reconsideration of (public) value(s) for public service accounting scholars, providing a critical reflection and setting new research avenues.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role and impact of accounting within the fragmented field of public value theory literature.

The work develops a structured literature review (SLR) and seeks to shed light on the state of public value research, with particular emphasis on the role of accounting scholarship.

The lack of empirical research and the limited number of accounting papers reveal how accounting scholars need to achieve a deeper understanding of the public value conceptualization, creation and measurement process.

The paper develops the first wide-ranging SLR on public value accounting. It is a starting point to develop new research avenues, both in the fields of accountability/external reporting, and management accounting and performance management.

This paper aims at reflecting on the role of accounting and accountability mechanisms in pre-COVID-19 conditions and how it may evolve in “new normal”, post-COVID-19 conditions.

Moving from the papers in this special issue, the authors draw on the literature on the social construction and reflective approaches to understand pre- and post-COVID-19 events and the role of accounting therein.

The “new normal” may exacerbated the difficulty of public sector organizations to manage the uncertainties and risks associated to the new context. While “old” wicked issues remain, such as social inclusion, poverty and corruption, new ones come. The authors speculate on the “new” and “old” roles accounting and accountability can play to support governments.

The paper contributes by setting new research avenues for future studies in a post-COVID-19 era.

This paper aims to contribute to the management control systems (MCS) changes in public-private partnerships (PPSs) by developing a conceptual archetype explaining the relationship between trust and MCSs in PPPs, and highlighting how this relationship may evolve over time.

The paper adopts a longitudinal case study methodology focusing on a hospital built and operated under a project finance deal. The methods adopted include semistructured interviews, direct observation and internal documentation analysis. We conducted 15 semistructured interviews from 2019 to 2021. In analyzing different documents and interviews, we triangulated data to ensure solid interpretation.

The case shows how trust can take different configurations depending on the type of MCS used. The results highlight how different patterns of MCSs, about trust, can be combined to govern PPPs. The case also shows the temporal dynamics of how MCS and trust evolve at different organizational levels and how bureaucratic control matched with contractual trust and trust-based control matched with competence trust can coexist at different times and organizational levels.

Managers involved in PPPs will be aware of the role of different types of trust in shaping and managing the relationship between partners at different organizational levels. Furthermore, the findings could help policymakers to adopt more informed decisions and to promote practice-based trust at various organizational levels of PPPs.

The paper proposes a management control archetype based on bureaucracy- and trust-based patterns concerning the level of programmability of tasks, as well as defined risks.

Inspite of the attention resilience receives in relation to public policy and public management, very few studies have analysed the internal mechanics of public sector organisations to see what is producing their resilience. Considering management control systems (MCSs) as the drivers of organisational change, this paper aims to explore their role as determinants of resilience in the public sector. The paper attempts to open the black box of organisational functioning focusing on one complex component.

This paper adopted a qualitative approach for this longitudinal case study. This paper used a mix of primary and secondary sources in terms of direct observation, semi-structured interviews and internal document analysis. This paper used a framework drawing on Barbera et al. (2017) and management control’s constraining and facilitating concepts to explore how anticipatory and coping capacities of resilience are supported and reinforced by MCSs.

Findings suggest that MCSs support adaptive behaviour and assist decision-making by providing knowledge and ready-to-use answers to cope with external shocks. However, this is found in case of the adoption of facilitating MCSs, which empower managers and employees and are based on stewardship roles. In such a context, MCSs played an essential role in shaping anticipatory and coping capacities. At the same time, financial shocks fostered the investment in MCSs, cyclically strengthening or developing new anticipatory and coping capacities.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is one of the first attempting to identify how facilitating MCSs, as a driver of organisational change, can make an organisation more resilient. It shows how resilience capacities are generated and strengthened via MCSs.

Governments are increasingly turning to artificial intelligence (AI) algorithmic systems to increase efficiency and effectiveness of public service delivery. While the diffusion of AI offers several desirable benefits, caution and attention should be posed to the accountability of AI algorithm decision-making systems in the public sector. The purpose of this paper is to establish the main challenges that an AI algorithm might bring about to public service accountability. In doing so, the paper also delineates future avenues of investigation for scholars.

This paper builds on previous literature and anecdotal cases of AI applications in public services, drawing on streams of literature from accounting, public administration and information technology ethics.

Based on previous literature, the paper highlights the accountability gaps that AI can bring about and the possible countermeasures. The introduction of AI algorithms in public services modifies the chain of responsibility. This distributed responsibility requires an accountability governance, together with technical solutions, to meet multiple accountabilities and close the accountability gaps. The paper also delineates a research agenda for accounting scholars to make accountability more “intelligent”.

The findings of the paper shed new light and perspective on how public service accountability in AI should be considered and addressed. The results developed in this paper will stimulate scholars to explore, also from an interdisciplinary perspective, the issues public service organizations are facing to make AI algorithms accountable.

The paper aims to understand the possible determinants of knowledge of, and interest in using, blockchain, with a particular focus in the future intention to apply this technology. Blockchain technology is deemed to radically change business models and processes. Using this technology in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) is still a novel idea. Moreover, not much is known about the diffusion and level of interest towards blockchain in SMEs. This research adopts a knowledge management perspective, drawing on technology acceptance model to highlight the level of blockchain technology diffusion, and to explore which factors lead SMEs’ to adopt blockchain.

This study distributed a questionnaire to a sample of 300 SMEs in Italy. This study received 96 responses (32% response rate). This study calculated descriptive statistics and undertook a reliability analysis. Finally, this study performed a logistic regression to analyse the determinants of further intention to use blockchain technology.

Results show that blockchain technology is quite well known, but the level of knowledge is limited. Moreover, the research reveals that the rate of adoption is very low. Interest in the future adoption of blockchain is associated with knowledge, perception of usefulness and ease of use of blockchain.

This paper is one of the first explorative studies showing which factors lead SMEs to adopt blockchain technologies and shedding some light on the interaction between knowledge management and blockchain adoption and diffusion in SMEs. It highlights how blockchain knowledge could determine future interest in blockchain innovation. This paper is relevant for public and private institutions that aim to promote, through knowledge management, the adoption of blockchain in SMEs.

In accounting education studies, there is increasing interest in using teaching visual tools and contents. However, research about the pedagogical benefits of visual in education is still limited. This paper aims to contribute to the debate by providing evidence on the extent to which the visual represents a relevant learning preference of accounting students.

The paper adopted the visual, aural, read/write, and kinesthetic questionnaire as a tested means to study the learning preferences of accounting students. The empirical study is based on a survey conducted with undergraduate and postgraduate accounting students.

The results show that visualization appears to be the less-relevant learning preference of students. This result is not in line with the emergent discussion in accounting education literature, which examines how visual tools can improve the presentation of accounting information. This opens the debate about the potential use of visual tools in teaching accounting. Besides, gender and origin of students (national vs international) appeared as relevant factors in explaining a greater visual learning preference.

This paper attempts to contribute to the accounting literature by providing evidence on the extent to which the visual represents the relevant learning preferences of accounting students. In addition, given that most of the literature on students’ learning preferences are based on Anglo-Saxon contexts, the authors provide evidence from a Latin country.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of performance management systems (PMSs) and their perceived accuracy on job crafting behaviors via motivation.

By adopting a research design based on three waves, a mediation model was tested using survey data from 12 municipalities in Italy.

Perceived PMS accuracy positively influences “approach” job crafting behaviors through intrinsic motivation and “avoidance” job crafting behaviors through extrinsic motivation.

Organizations interested in promoting job crafting should ensure that PMSs are designed and implemented in a way that increases perceived PMS accuracy among employees.

The results of this study enrich the literature on job crafting by underlining the role of PMSs as an antecedent of job crafting and by clarifying how different motivational processes may intervene in this relationship.

Risk management (RM) is receiving increasing academic and practitioner attention in the public sector. Despite this, there is a lack of systematization of this body of knowledge. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the state of art by examining the knowledge gaps and defining the emerging themes of RM in the public sector to guide future research agendas.

The authors conducted a structured literature review (SLR). They analyzed 63 papers, by using Scopus database, published from 1990 to 2018. All papers were categorized and analyzed according to 11 criteria defined by the literature.

Results show that there is an increasing attention to RM with a need for more effort to consolidate research knowledge. Findings also established a lack of theorization, with a limited explanatory capacity of most studies. The paper defined four main areas for future developments to increase the body of knowledge. Namely, RM and managerial systems (i.e. MCSs and performance management), integrating RM systems and the building blocks of RM that the authors identify will also play a role in helping the authors to understand the diffusion of RM within public sector organizations.

Despite the increasing attention to RM in the public sector, more research is required. Considering RM in public sector risks to be a “black box”, this paper revealed some new insights that could help to analyze better RM in the public sector, to open the black box and to avoid a symbolic use of the RM. In fact, integration with the managerial systems and the strengthening of the building block could help to exploit the potential of RM in the public sector.