Public (dis)value accounting and accountability: a stakeholder theory perspective

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Introduction

Stakeholder theory encourages organisations to consider the needs and demands of their internal and external stakeholders. In doing so, it presents a more holistic and responsible framework that facilitates value creation extending beyond mere financial performance (Donaldson & Preston, 1995; Freeman, 1984; Parmar et al., 2010). Expanding on Freeman’s (1984) work, Donaldson and Preston (1995) argued that effective stakeholder management can contribute to long-term competitive advantage. They also classified three theoretical approaches to stakeholder theory: Descriptive, Instrumental, and Normative.

A recent literature review concluded that despite the widespread adoption of stakeholder theory in private sector studies, minimal attention has been directed toward the public sector context, in both practice and theory (Sarturi et al., 2023). This gap is also evident in accounting research, where studies have predominantly focused on corporate financial statements or sustainability reporting content, often remaining anchored to the perspective of shareholder primacy (Miles, 2019; Williams & Adams, 2013). This research gap is partly attributable to the origins of stakeholder theory itself, which emerged to challenge the traditional shareholder-centric view of the firm by including other strategic stakeholders in value creation and distribution (Freeman, 1984). Nevertheless, stakeholder theory possesses the potential to support public sector managers and policymakers in addressing ethical issues while fostering trust, transparency, and cooperation. A clearer understanding of the strategies stakeholders enact to influence accounting standard setters, the profession, academia, public managers, and politicians is required to advance stakeholder theory within the accounting domain.

The capacity to properly balance diverse stakeholder interests to ensure societal well-being can lead to public value creation (Bracci et al., 2021; Steccolini, 2019) or, conversely, its destruction (Esposito & Ricci, 2015; Cui & Osborne, 2023). This dichotomy highlights the need for careful stakeholder relationship management and robust accountability mechanisms to prevent or trigger actions that could generate public (dis)value (Esposito & Ricci, 2014). This requirement becomes even more crucial in the post-New Public Management (NPM) era, where public governance and the pursuit of public value(s) present significant challenges for public sector organisations regarding stakeholder engagement (Bracci et al., 2021; Steccolini, 2019). Furthermore, the emergence of hybrid organisations in public service and program delivery (e.g., Public-Private Partnerships, state-owned enterprises) presents both challenges and opportunities for accounting research and practice (Grossi et al., 2021). In this context, Bryson et al. (2014) argued that within democratic and cooperative governance, governments act as guarantors of public value(s), acknowledging that stakeholder engagement is essential for successful policy and strategy development and implementation.

Accounting and accountability scholars have begun to focus on how accounting affects—and is affected by—a public value governance and strategy perspective, which incorporates the role of stakeholders in public policy and services (Bracci et al., 2019; Douglas & Overmans, 2020; Moore, 2014). Douglas and Overmans (2020) proposed an alternative perspective for designing and managing the budgeting process in public sector organisations, identifying collaboration with relevant stakeholders as a cornerstone of their framework. Other studies have identified a positive relationship between the degree of citizen participation in the budgetary process and the perceived degree of administrative accountability (Handley & Howell-Moroney, 2010). Another emerging research stream concerns the relationship between stakeholders, strategy, and performance measurement (Andersen et al., 2016; Johnsen, 2005).

The public value literature has drawn attention to what the general public values and the democratic or collaborative processes through which this is achieved (Meynhardt, 2019; Moore, 1995). Similarly, value is central to stakeholder theory, as it provides a model that permits the viewing of value creation and distribution from a more holistic perspective, considering what stakeholders deem worthy of creation and achievement (Parmar et al., 2010). Public value is shaped and transformed when stakeholders grapple with difficult social issues, particularly when considerable tensions and controversy arise (Hartley et al., 2019).

Public sector managers and politicians can benefit from adopting stakeholder theory models to act upon a shared sense of value, plan stakeholder engagement in decision-making processes, and determine how public value should be accounted for. This involves understanding the roles of trust, reciprocity, and fairness, and how accounting and accountability can improve the relationships among public sector organisations, public managers, and their stakeholders to create more value while simultaneously making it visible. Building on these tenets, this special issue calls for the submission of interdisciplinary empirical and conceptual papers seeking to untangle the intricate relationships between accounting, accountability, and public value from a stakeholder theory perspective. Literature reviews will not be considered.

List of Topic Areas

Potential themes of interest, addressed according to the AAAJ aims and scope, could be the following:

• How can public value be measured for different stakeholder groups?
• How can accounting mediate - or exacerbate - those differences in value(s)?
• How can the creation, reduction and destruction of public value be accounted for and what role of stakeholders?
• How can accounting support either the creation or the destruction of public value(s) from a stakeholder perspective?
• How can accounting and accountability mediate between disputed public value(s) across stakeholders?
• How accounting can foster the recovery of diminished or destroyed public value?
• How stakeholders' strategies affect accounting and accounting decision-makers (e.g. accounting standards, accountants)?
• How can management accounting practices contribute or work against stakeholder engagement?
• How can alternative reporting practices foster stakeholders' engagement, and how the latter can shaper accounting practices in turn?
• How does public sector management and/or politicians prioritize stakeholders when it comes to public value(s) identification, and how can accounting avoid or foster this trade-offs?

Guest Editors 

Paolo Esposito  University of Naples “Parthenope”, Italy, paolo.esposito@uniparthenope.it

Robert Edward Freeman, University of Virginia Darden School of Business, USA, FREEMANE@darden.virginia.edu

Enrico Bracci, University of Ferrara, Italy, enrico.bracci@unife.it

Submissions Information

Submissions are made using ScholarOne Manuscripts. Author guidelines must be strictly followed.

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Author Guidelines

Authors should select (from the drop-down menu) the special issue title at the appropriate step in the submission process, i.e. in response to “Please select the issue you are submitting to”. 

Submitted articles must not have been previously published, nor should they be under consideration for publication anywhere else, while under review for this journal.

Key Deadlines

Opening date for manuscripts submissions: 30th October 2025

Closing date for manuscripts submission: 14th February 2026