Dr Andrea Mennicken (MAR 3.24)

This course is available on the MSc in Accounting, Organisations and Institutions. This course is not available as an outside option.

The course is intended for students interested in pursuing an academic career, conducting policy research or with some other relevant research motive. Registration is by permission only. Students wishing to select this option must prepare a dissertation proposal in AT (approx. 500 words). This should be submitted to the programme manager by November 22nd. The course convener will then review the submissions, and for those with sufficient potential, will allocate a suitable supervisor. Approval for this option will only be forthcoming for those with submissions that reach the required standard and for which a suitable supervisor is available. Enrolment on this course is capped at 15 students.

The objective of this half-unit course is to enable Masters students to develop a research paper on institutional, social and political aspects accounting which could serve as the foundation for future doctoral studies or other research careers.

The focus of the dissertation - theoretical, empirical and methodological - will be determined by students in conjunction with an allocated supervisor. Supervisors have expertise in a broad range of research areas including, for example, accounting and auditing as social practice, social studies of valuation and quantification, risk regulation and the creation of markets.

It is intended that the dissertation could be used in any application for an advanced research degree.

Students are expected to work largely independently on their own. There will be an introductory orientation at the beginning of Winter Term on how to write and research for a dissertation, including the use of library resources. Thereafter students receive two to three one-to-one supervisory sessions prior to final submission to help with the definition, orientation and execution of the research topic. In addition, a workshop will be organised for all students where they discuss and receive collective feedback on their dissertation outlines.

Students will be required to produce written work in preparation for the meetings with their supervisors and for the joint workshop where the dissertation outlines are discussed.

The following books provide an overview of key research themes in studies of accounting, organisations and institutions:

• Chapman, Cooper & Miller (eds), Accounting, Organizations and Institutions (Oxford, 2009);
• Hopwood & Miller (eds), Accounting as Social and Institutional Practice (Cambridge, 1994);
• Mennicken & Salais (eds), The New Politics of Numbers (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022);
• Power, The Audit Society (Oxford, 1999).

Students will be encouraged to develop their own reading lists, which will be specific to the area and focus of the dissertation.

Dissertation (100%, 8000 words) in the ST.

An electronic copy of the dissertation (6000-8000 words) must be emailed to the MSc Accounting, Organisations and Institutions Programme Manager by 30 May. An additional electronic copy must be uploaded to Moodle on the same day.