I. History and culture
Christian culture is the mainstream culture in western history. Although Christianity believes that people are born with "original sin" and the process of life is atonement, and the Bible also has the "Ten Commandments of Moses" as the code of conduct for believers, Christianity does not regard making profits in business as a sin. On the contrary, Christian churches often use a lot of commercial activities to ensure the daily expenses of the church. Even in the feudal kingdom of the Middle Ages, mercantilism has become the guiding ideology of some countries and penetrated into the national economic system. After the Renaissance, the idea of natural human rights was deeply rooted in people's hearts, the seeds of capitalism gradually developed, the capitalist system began to take shape, and the pursuit of profit was taken for granted. After the bourgeois revolution in Britain and France, the capitalist system, as a national system, was established in some European countries. Driven by the motive of competing for high profits, the capitalist economy operates under the control of the "invisible hand". Prior to this, capitalist production often pursued profits under the condition of extensive management, and the requirements for accounting were not very high. Western accounting has not changed much on the basis of previous garden accounting. After the arrival of the industrial revolution, the rapid development of science and technology triggered organizational change and innovation. With the equalization of social profits, traditional extensive management can no longer meet the needs of profits, and production is further intensive. The emergence of joint-stock companies characterized by the separation of ownership and management rights is the most important organizational innovation in this period. Modern and popular classical accounting ideas mostly come from the practice of joint-stock companies (especially in the United States). Today, most management accounting methods are produced in 1825- 1925, and this is precisely the period when the company system is gradually improving. It should be said that people's demand for accurate information on profits is increasingly urgent, which greatly improves the method of collecting, sorting out and analyzing a large number of various data generated in the daily operation of enterprises. More importantly, it leads to the reform of accounting system and the separation of accounting and management fields. The new accounting system is divided into three categories: financial accounting, fixed capital accounting and cost accounting. In this way, the embryonic form of modern accounting was established in the deepening of the capitalist system. Later, at the beginning of the 20th century, a large number of companies and enterprises made great contributions to the development of accounting. For example, DuPont Company effectively combined three basic types of accounting (financial accounting, fixed capital accounting and cost accounting) for the first time, laying the foundation of modern asset accounting; By 19 10, they had developed a set of accounting methods and accounting supervision, which later became the standard accounting procedure for industrial enterprises in the 20th century. Under the control of the "invisible hand", there will inevitably be some chaos in the capitalist economy. Since the 1929- 1937 economic crisis, some people think that loose accounting practice is one of the reasons for the collapse of the American capital market. In this case, the United States promulgated the Securities Law and the Securities Exchange Law in 1933 and 1934 respectively, stipulating that listed companies must provide unified accounting information, and established the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in 1934, and asked this institution to be responsible for formulating unified accounting rules that listed companies must abide by, so as to make financial affairs. Through the unremitting efforts of SEC, APB, FASB and other standard-setting institutions and their related interest groups, by the mid-1950s, the United States had formed a relatively standardized accounting standards system.
In the east of the world, a relatively perfect financial institution appeared in the Zhou Dynasty in China. In the next 3000 years, the financial organization of Guanting has undergone several changes, and gradually formed a set of strict internal control system and highly centralized financial system. During the Tang and Song Dynasties, a major breakthrough in China's accounting method-"four-column settlement method" was formed, which was once in a leading position in the history of world accounting development. In the folk, accounting has experienced a development process from single bookkeeping to double bookkeeping. Because the social and economic development of China was in a "sandwich state" in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, accounting methods such as Longmen Account and Quadrupole Account were also in a "sandwich state". Compared with western double-entry bookkeeping, Chinese double-entry bookkeeping still has many imperfections, such as the book organization is not strict enough, the accounting items are not scientific enough, the account system is not perfect enough, the format of account pages and closing books is too simple, the application of original vouchers is not strict enough, accounting vouchers can not be used to sort out accounts, and the application of basic accounting methods is still cumbersome and messy, which shows that Chinese double-entry bookkeeping is still in its infancy. At the end of Qing Dynasty, the introduction of western-style accounting and the improvement of accounting in China began. After the founding of New China, it experienced the introduction of Soviet accounting and western accounting. So far, a set of accounting model with China characteristics has been initially established.
A careful analysis of the above-mentioned development process of Chinese and western accounting shows the relationship between accounting development and historical and cultural differences.
In western culture, the constant struggle against nature has always been an eternal theme, which may be related to its geographical environment. The spirit of exploration and adventure has been deeply integrated into the national spirit of westerners. After the Renaissance, western philosophy broke out of the imprisonment of theology, and an important focus of scientific rationality was to doubt the existing theories. With the development and maturity of the capitalist system, the profit-seeking motive has penetrated into all aspects of social life; Especially in contemporary times, pragmatic philosophy is very popular. In this way, with the continuous development of the capitalist economic system, accounting methods and theories can continue to develop and evolve.
In China, harmony with nature has been advocated since ancient times. For a long time, China, as a big agricultural country, the feudal rulers of past dynasties carried out the policy of "emphasizing agriculture and restraining commerce", while most intellectuals regarded other skills besides reading sage books as "strange skills" and "carving small skills". Therefore, although China's accounting has made brilliant achievements, it is not taken seriously. As a skill, it is passed on between master and apprentice, and it is difficult to form a systematic theoretical system. Under the unified feudal centralized rule, official accounting developed more maturely, while private accounting was much less mature. China's tradition of "valuing righteousness over profit" makes accountants pay less attention to the use of accounting vouchers, which not only leads to the fact that private accountants in China lag behind the official departments in the use of accounting vouchers, but also leads to the fact that China's accounting lags behind western accounting in modern times. After the founding of New China, although the national economy has taken on a new look, due to political influence, accounting thought has been bound by left-leaning thought and has not developed greatly. Although this situation is influenced by political factors, it cannot be said that it is related to the lack of a spirit of doubt and innovation in China's traditional culture.
Second, thinking mode.
From the way of thinking, since the Renaissance, western culture has advocated science and rationality, and the thinking habit of piecemeal analysis can be seen from the theoretical system of contemporary disciplines, so that the 20th century is called "the century of analysis". Concept, judgment and reasoning, the main elements of formal logic, constitute the glue of western scientific system. This way of thinking facilitates the establishment of the theoretical system of western accounting and makes the whole theoretical structure logical and clear. But this kind of thinking habit also has its weakness, that is, it lacks the overall grasp of things and is easy to make the mistake of "seeing the trees but not the forest". In this era of faster and faster rhythm and more and more information flow, this mode of thinking can no longer meet people's requirements.
The thinking habits of orientals are just the opposite. Especially in China, people are used to grasping the whole, but they are inferior in the analysis of details. China traditional culture emphasizes "clear mind and clear nature" and advocates using subjective "mind" to understand, so as to achieve the unity of subject and object. However, most scholars hold a negative attitude towards the concrete analysis of literal meaning, think that language is just an expression tool, and advocate "forgetting to sign the fish" without being entangled in the trap of language. What's more, as a combination of China's traditional culture and Buddhism, Zen believes that enlightenment lies in "enlightenment", and once you are in Wenyu, your understanding of the world will fall into a misunderstanding. This way of thinking emphasizes "change", but lacks precise definition and identification of essence, which makes concepts often overlap and obscure in theory, and has a great negative impact on the development of modern science in China, which lags behind the West. The instability of China's accounting standards can be said to be related to this mode of thinking. But in fact, in a sense, this cognitive thinking is superior to the western cutting thinking, because the understanding of the world should be the overall perception. However, it is important that when our understanding has not developed to a certain height, we should combine the eastern and western ways of thinking, give full play to their respective advantages, learn from each other's strengths, build a new theoretical system and method system, and improve our cognitive level.
Many western accounting theories or standards are often difficult to implement after being introduced into China, or they are far from the expected ones, which is related to the differences in political and economic systems between China and the West, as well as the differences in thinking and cognitive models between China and the West. Due to years of westernization education, accounting theory researchers and policy makers often have a westernized way of thinking, while among the people, the traditional way of thinking has a great influence, thus creating a great gap between theory, policy and practice. This gap is not only the contradiction between "knowing" and "doing", but also the result of the collision between eastern and western cultures.
Third, research mechanism.
Under the free economic model of European and American countries, researchers, funds and enterprises are inextricably linked, and it is natural for Industry-University-Research to combine. In authoritative accounting organizations, the core figures are often theorists, practitioners and educators, such as Montgomery, Peyton and lyttleton. Looking back on the development of accounting in western capitalist countries, we can see that both accounting theory and accounting technology are closely related to the actual needs of enterprises. In other words, the demand of enterprises and economy is the direction of accounting development. Under the relatively perfect educational and scientific research system, the accumulation and dissemination of knowledge can proceed smoothly and a subject can develop healthily. The communication and contention between different schools can make the discipline develop more rapidly.
In China, as mentioned above, accounting, as a skill that has been handed down from generation to generation, is difficult to be systematically studied as a science. For example, in the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties, Longmen Account appeared in commercial circles and banks. It is said that it was created by the famous doctor Fu Qingzhu in order to fight against the Qing Dynasty and regain sight. The development of this kind of accounting technology is really accidental due to the limitation of economic development and research system. For a long time after the founding of New China, accounting research served politics to a great extent, and the scientific research mechanism was re-planned. The bad habit of "belittling scholars" in China's cultural tradition is a huge obstacle to the exchange and development of various schools: the research of a few researchers is not so much centered on problems as on the vital interests such as degrees and professional titles. These problems are also important factors that make it difficult to effectively form a benign research mechanism. In addition, due to the lack of authority, China's accounting organizations often lack binding force in practice, so the motivation for discipline development is insufficient.
Above, we have made a rough comparison between Chinese and western cultural differences on the research of accounting development, from which we can see that cultural factors also have an important impact on the development of accounting. The difference of history and culture is the main cultural factor of accounting development difference, and the difference of thinking mode is an important factor that can not be ignored in forming the difference of accounting development between East and West. A good research mechanism is a necessary condition to promote the healthy development of accounting.
The holistic thinking mode of China people is superior to the western analytical and cutting thinking mode in grasping things as a whole, and it can better meet the requirements of the times, which provides favorable conditions for the development of accounting in China. For example, the traditional western-style accounting report has been difficult to meet the needs of current economic development. The application of multimedia technology or mathematical methods such as differential equation and difference equation to accounting statements reflects the overall appearance of enterprise management and seems to give full play to the overall thinking advantages of Chinese people. Unfortunately, our current education has actually been westernized, and the habit of holistic thinking is being replaced by western cutting thinking. This phenomenon is really worrying.
In addition, under the tide of global economic integration, China's current role is very limited. Only when China's economy truly becomes the locomotive of the world economy, when the concept of market economy is deeply rooted in people's hearts, and when the accounting research system really helps to promote economic development, can China's accounting be at the forefront of the world. The advanced way of thinking only provides considerable possibilities for the leading development of accounting in China. To turn this possibility into reality, we need China's strong economy, the improvement of national quality and the joint efforts of accountants in China.