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Contents: This paper reviews the emerging use of critical realism in the accounting literature over the past decade, and explores how the critical realism can enhance theoretical coherence of future accounting research. The review of the accounting literature found that the use of critical realism was piecemeal, and its critical dimension has not fully embraced by accounting researchers. At the last section, it is suggested that critical realist approach, such as retroductive and retrodictive mode of explanations, can contribute to the accounting literature. A reader who already has a good understanding of critical realism can skip the second lection (pp. 5-17) which provides in-depth explanation of critical realism.
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Context: This paper is the most recent version of a series of Sven Modell’s work
(2009, 2013, in press) on critical realism in the accounting research. He has presented the critical realism as a philosophical solution to overcome the problem of paradigmatic inconsistencies found in management accounting research that used mixed methods taking both functionalist and interpretative approach at the same time
(Modell, 2009), in public sector accounting research that used multiple number of theories regardless of their ontological assumptions (Modell, 2013), and in accounting research that combined institutional and critical theories in paradigmatically inconsistent way (Modell, in press).
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Contribution: This paper, as well as previous work of Modell, encourages accounting scholars to reflect on the paradigmatic basis of the theories and methods they use.
Considering that a large number of accounting papers either do not use an explicit theoretical framework (Jacobs, 2012) or blend theories from different sociological authors in spite of their paradigmatic tensions (Jacobs, 2012; Modell, 2013), it is no wonder that accounting academics are not always cognisant of ontological basis of the theories they use. In this context, this paper helps us to think about paradigmatic basis of the theoretical and methodological approaches of our research.
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Caveat: Accounting students need to prioritise their contribution from the use of critical realism and retroduction approach in particular. I support the idea that retroduction and retrodiction procedure will enhance our understanding of evolving

accounting practices. However, retroductive, or abductive (Modell, 2009), explanation enhances not only our understanding of accounting practice but also our understanding of theories. Therefore, we come across a question: does my research enhance our understanding of accounting or our understanding of a theory? I saw quite a few PhD students present theoretical contribution of their research more than their contribution to the accounting knowledge. They theorise their case study, instead of an accounting problem, with a certain theory (Jacobs, 2013) and argue that their case contributes to the theory. However, I would argue that our main job is to contribute to the accounting knowledge although our theoretical understanding will improve as a by-product. The author also clarifies this point by stating that the critical realism plays “the role of philosophical under-labourer in advancing our knowledge of evolving accounting practices” (p. 18), although he assigned more than one third of the paper to the explanation of the critical realism. Therefore, I support the use of retroduction and retrodiction explanation as long as our priority is to enhance our understanding of accounting practice.
Jacobs, K. (2012), “Making sense of social practice: Theoretical pluralism in public sector accounting research”, Financial Accountability & Management , 28(1): 1-25.
Jacobs, K. (2013) “Making sense of social practice: theoretical pluralism in public sector accounting research: a reply”, Financial Accountability and Management , 29(1): 111-115.
Modell, S. (2009), “In defence of triangulation: A critical realist approach to mixed methods research in management accounting”, Management Accounting Research , 20(3): 208–221.
Modell, S. (2013), “Making Sense of Social Practice: Theoretical Pluralism in Public Sector
Accounting Research: A Comment”, Financial Accountability & Management , 29(1): 99–
110.
Modell, S. (in press), “Making Institutional Accounting Research Critical: Dead End or New
Beginning?” Accounting, Accountability and Auditing Journal .