Sotirios Karatzimas

Athens University of Economics and Business | AUEB · Department of Accounting and Finance

Purpose This study explores the relationship between debt intensity and cost stickiness at the local government level, a setting characterized by the existence of debt constraints and political influence. Design/methodology/approach Building on a theoretical framework informed by the concepts of coercive isomorphism and accountability, the present...

Purpose The scope of this study is to explore informed citizens' engagement in the development of real municipalities' popular reports. For this purpose, an exploratory experiment is performed where potential users of popular reports with certain accounting skills (i.e. groups of undergraduate accounting students) act as preparers of these reports....

Master’s of Public Administration (MPA) and Master’s of Public Management (MPM) programmes are expected to equip current and future public administrators with essential skills. Many scholars have analysed the consistency between public sector accounting education and the required competencies. While some studies gavce highlighted the need for inclu...

Recent literature highlights the importance of providing citizens public sector accounting education to help them become public finance literate. This study performs a questionnaire-based survey to a convenient sample of citizens to collect their perspective on the topic. The results indicate an average familiarity of the respondents with key publi...

Both public sector accounting research and practice have advanced significantly over the past few decades. This evolution has been largely the result of the ‘golden age’ of New Public Management (Steccolini, 2018). Public sector accounting education (PSAE) has contributed to the advancement of public sector accounting and accountability but its rol...

IMPACT Public sector accounting education (PSAE) plays an essential role in the proper functioning of government operations. The application of the accrual basis in the public sector, as well as the internationalization of public sector accounting, has increased the demand for study programmes in that area. Whereas the interest in PSAE has increase...

IMPACT Information and communication technology (ICT) in learning can be an enabler to increase awareness and understandability of public sector financial statements for users. This article presents software that makes accounting information more easily understood by non-experts, such as public administration professionals. It is intended for infor...

Purpose This study examines the reporting practices of a sample of awarded smart cities that report in English by analyzing the financial and non-financial reports published in their websites. Design/methodology/approach The study performs a manifest content analysis on the financial and non-financial reports published by a sample of awarded – by...

IMPACT Smart cities’ technological orientation makes citizens mere observers of the ‘smart’ choices made, with little room for participation. Citizen engagement is a social innovation process targeting the co-production of public value. Receiving sufficient ‘smart’ education in public sector accounting could be useful to citizens and the city alike...

This study explores municipal cost behavior during periods of financial crisis and strict financial sustainability legislation. The study employees Anderson, Banker, and Janakiraman approach on a data sample of 48,096 observations from Spanish municipalities for the period 2008-2018. The results suggest that during this period municipality total, s...

Purpose Greece had to undertake several reforms under intense policy conditionality pressures – stemming from the three financial support programs agreed between the Greek Government and the Troika – and political instability. Within this context, this study aims to analyze the role of politicians and technical assistance staff in the administrativ...

The aim of this study is to bring under the spotlight the need for a broader public sector accounting education plan that would facilitate the development of participatory citizens. The study develops a conceptual framework that links citizens’ government accounting literacy with various community-related decisions and in particular citizens’ votin...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine and compare the views of mayors and comptrollers of Catalan municipalities on aspects related to the Spanish legislation on financial sustainability – its usefulness and necessity of maintaining, its impact on citizens’ welfare and alternative proposals. The setting is rather interesting as strict rul...

The scope of this chapter is to examine the concept of financial sustainability in Catalan municipalities through two different perspectives: The first refers to the perspective of law as it is recorded in the relevant legislation. The second refers to the point of view of mayors and municipality executives who were called to implement the legislat...

The scope of this chapter is to examine the concept of financial sustainability in Catalan municipalities through two different perspectives: The first refers to the perspective of law as it is recorded in the relevant legislation. The second refers to the point of view of mayors and municipality executives who were called to implement the legislat...

Purpose This paper explores the role the Troika’s advent played in the progress of the budgeting and the financial reporting systems reform at the Greek central government level. Design/methodology/approach The approach of an extreme country-case study is adopted. The data used in the paper have been identified through document analysis performe...

Purpose The present study explores the asymmetric cost behaviour in Greek local governments. More precisely, it investigates whether municipality costs show stickiness or anti-stickiness behaviour after increases or decreases in the stream of their revenues. Design/methodology/approach The Anderson et al.’s (2003) approach is adapted to the public...

Popular reporting is a means of bringing local government financial information closer to citizens. Nevertheless, the interest of citizens on popular reports appears to be less than optimal. In this paper, we assess whether the use of modern technology and the Internet could boost citizens' interest in popular reporting, which in turn would potenti...

Purpose – This paper aims to provide an assessment of the decision-usefulness and quality of governmental financial reports in Greece under the recently adopted modified-cash basis. The evaluation is performed within the wider debate regarding the actual benefits of a transition toward an accounting paradigm that lies closer to accrual accounting a...

The ascent of the knowledge economy and the advance of ICT have resulted in e-learning becoming an application that provides accessible, timely and affordable learning experiences. The present study aims at recording how potential users evaluate the usefulness of a web-based accounting platform that operates as both an educational accounting platfo...

This paper examines the standard-setting process during the recent reform of government accounting standards in Greece. The process is viewed through the lens of the ‘garbage can’ model, informed by interviews, informal discussions and archival data. Findings indicate a lack of effective monitoring of the process by politicians and external lenders...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to debate the future form of reporting in the public sector by examining alternative forms of reporting, and more specifically the frameworks of integrated reporting and popular reporting. Moreover, the paper explores whether and how these reports could be related to each other in order for the needs of a pill...

In the present study we examine the impact of the recent financial crisis on the management accounting systems of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) in Greece. More specifically, we assess whether and to what extent Greek SMEs have adjusted their management accounting systems as a reaction to the intense pressures deriving from the extensive...

This paper examines the suitability of different accounting bases in providing useful information to support privatisation decisions of state–owned property. More specifically, a comparison is conducted between the recently adopted Greek Governmental Accounting Standards (GGAS) that follow a modified cash basis and accrual–based IPSAS with referenc...

Purpose: The present study explores the asymmetric cost behavior in Greek local governments. More precisely, we investigate whether municipality costs show stickiness or anti-stickiness behavior after increases or decreases in the stream of their revenues. Design/Methodology/Approach: We adapt Anderson et al.'s (2003) approach to the public sector...

Dans le présent article, nous examinons l’introduction et l’abandon soudain de la budgétisation par programmes en Grèce. L’analyse a été réalisée à travers le prisme de la théorie néo-institutionnelle, de la théorie du changement organisationnel et du modèle de la dépendance à l’égard des ressources. Le cadre mis au point s’appuie sur des données d...

The article examines the timetable of the introduction and the sudden abandoning of program budgeting in Greece. The analysis is conducted through the lens of neo-institutional theory, organizational change theory and the resource dependency model. The framework developed is informed by archival data and the views of executives involved with the pr...

Purpose: In this paper we examine the standard-setting process at the central government level in a country operating under special circumstances of financial strain. More specifically, we analyze the decision-making process under which the new modified cash-based set of accounting standards was developed in the Greek central government.Design/meth...

Purpose: In this paper we debate the future form of reporting in the public sector by examining alternative forms of reporting, and more specifically the frameworks of integrated reporting and popular reporting. Moreover, we explore whether and how these reports could be related to each other in order for the needs of a pillar user group, that of t...

The ascent of knowledge economy and the advance of ICT have placed e-learning as a mainstream application by providing knowledge workers with learning experiences that are accessible, timely and affordable. Accountants constitute a professional group whose work has been significantly affected by ICT developments. However, existing literature is not...

Following recommendations made by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 2005 concerning the modernization of the budget management, the Greek government decided to proceed in applying program budgeting. After several years of intensive preparations with pilot program budgets of ministries being prepared and published along with the traditional s...

The present study is an attempt to examine the impact of the IFRS adoption on management accounting. More specifically, the internal reporting methods, the management accounting practices and techniques, as well as, the implications on decision making and the interaction between external and internal reporting, after the IFRS transition in Greece,...

The present paper examines the accounting principles relevant to the privatization of state-owned property through the sale and the financial lease of assets under the Greek Governmental Accounting Standards (GGAS) and IPSAS. More specifically, we explore the accounting information quality and availability as well as the accounting methods and prac...

This paper examines the suitability of different accounting bases in providing useful information to support privatisation decisions of state-owned property. More specifically, a comparison is conducted between the recently adopted Greek Governmental Accounting Standards (GGAS) that follow a modified cash basis and accrual-based IPSAS with referenc...

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine the involvement of the human resources (HR) department throughout the budgeting process and furthermore to investigate the use of budgets for motivation, communication, performance evaluation and control in the Greek business environment, from the perspective of the HR department managers. Design/m...

The present study examines the changes that occurred in the accounting policies of the Greek companies after the adoption of IAS. More precisely, a comparison analysis between the manufacturing and the commercial sector is conducted. In order to achieve that, we analyze the impact of the IAS transition in the net income of the Greek listed manufact...