Applying international standards in France: how professional accountants manage IFRS complexity?

The application of IFRS does not take shape in an institutional vacuum and may call into question international accounting harmonization. The authors aim at studying the interpretation’s process of international standards (IFRS) by French accounting professionals. To do so, they studied 174 professional articles published in the Revue Française de Comptabilité (RFC) and by major accounting firms in France over a period of 17 years. Their results show a multitude of frameworks and systems of meaning used by French accounting professionals to manage the difficulties of applying IFRS. Most of these frameworks remain local and/or regional despite international amendments over time. This plurality of professional judgment constructs opens the door to possible and diverse local practices. Moreover, the evolution of the international framework, combined with a changing application environment (social, legal and political), makes the effort of interpretation in a national context dynamic and continuous.

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This paper is published in Editions EMS

Authors: Mohamed Taieb Hamadi, Sami El Omari, Wafa Khlif