title: The feasibility and desirability of pursuing accounting harmonisation in five Asean countries : a study of corporate financial reporting in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand
Creators: name: Diga, Joselito Gaetos
Publisher: name: The Australian National University
Year: 1996
Subjects: subject: Accounting ASEAN countries
subject: Accounting Standards ASEAN countries
subject: Corporations AccountingASEAN countries

description: The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has emerged as an important political and economic group in the Asian-Pacific region. Increasingly, attention has been drawn to policy initiatives aimed at promoting trade and investment, both within ASEAN and between ASEAN and other countries. One of these initiatives has been the possible harmonisation of financial accounting rules and practices among the ASEAN member countries in order to stimulate cross-border trade and investment activities. This thesis discusses the feasibility and desirability of pursuing accounting harmonisation among five ASEAN countries: Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. Three interrelated objectives are pursued. First, the current features of national financial accounting systems are described comprehensively in Part II using a comparative descriptive framework (Chapter 2). This analysis reveals that in the five countries: • the broad aims of financial accounting are oriented, in general, towards a micro-user view of accounting (Chapter 3); • the institutional environments have been instrumental in each country's adoption of International Accounting Standards (Chapter 4); • measure,nent rules and practices have achieved a moderately high degree of harmony (Chapter 5); and • contents of disclosure rules are quite similar although disclosure practices remain significantly different (Chapter 6). Overall, a relatively high degree of harmony was evident among the national financial accounting systems in ASEAN. Second, Part III evaluates the potential contribution of alternative explanatory frameworks to understanding how and why financial accounting systems differ among the five countries (Chapter 7). The functional paradigm (Chapter 8) discloses that characteristics of capital markets, taxation systems and economic planning regimes in ASEAN countries partly explain the patterns of financial accounting observed. Moreover, the role of accounting in securities markets has been a powerful impetus for seeking harmonisation within a micro-user oriented model of accounting. The transaction cost economics approach (Chapter 9) suggests that empirically observed patterns of ASEAN financial accounting systems can be explained also by converging transaction cost environments. The interpretive paradigm (Chapter 10) indicates that cultural characteristics explain some of the persistent differences among ASEAN financial accounting systems and between ASEAN systems and those of other countries. The critical paradigm (Chapter 11) reveals that powerful and hegemonic ideological forces are underpinning the push for accounting harmonisation. Overall, the explanatory analyses in Part ill reveal that ASEAN countries are venues for conflicting domestic and international pressures. Economic, political and ideological factors promoting convergence are offset by cultural factors which impede the harmonisation of their financial accounting systems. Finally, Part IV provides policy recommendations regarding the desirability and feasibility of pursuing accounting harmonisation in ASEAN. These recommendations recognise the importance of achieving an appropriate balance between the preferences of international users and those of local constituents. The debate over accounting harmonisation in ASEAN also needs to be widened to address enterprise accountability issues related to promoting social equity and environmental sustainability.