Resumen de Accounting diversity and its causes in cooperative accounting in Europe
Fernando Polo Garrido, Sergio Marí Vidal
The present work focuses on the study of accounting diversity in Europe, applied to a specific type of company: cooperatives. The singular aspects of cooperatives and the lack of studies on accounting diversity in cooperatives have motivated us to undertake a study which documents the existence of accounting diversity and later addresses the variables which may explain this diversity.
The four countries studied were Germany, Spain, France and the United Kingdom, including both Anglo-Saxon and continental countries in accordance with Nobes’ classification.
An understanding of the accounting diversity is significant when appraising financial statements from different countries. Even in the case of financial statements are elaborated under International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRSs) differences remain important because they influence the way people in different countries interpret an apply international rules, specially when specific issues are not addresses in the IFRSs. As International Co-operative Alliance points out, these questions are not only significant for accountants, because of accounting standards can have an impact in cooperatives and an understanding of accounting matters has a wide interest in addition to accountants.
