Regulation, the public interest and the establishment of an accounting supervisory body

The accounting/auditing profession in Ireland has maintained a form of self-regulation since the era of professional formation in the late-nineteenth century. In general, the view taken was that the public interest was best served by allowing the profession to monitor and regulate its own members. This reflected a general confidence in the workings of the market, with regulation being considered necessary only to address specific shortcomings. In recent years, a combination of factors ranging from corporate collapses in which the independence of the auditing profession was questioned, to a variety of political pressures arising from globalisation and the exigencies of international financial markets, have created an environment in which increased state involvement has been seen as critical to securing the public interest. In Ireland, these international developments conjoined with political and media disquiet at revelations regarding the conduct of prominent accountants and auditing firms to create an environment in which modifications to this regime could be considered. The result was a state initiative to introduce an independent authority, the Irish Auditing and Accounting Supervisory Authority, to regulate the profession. Using public interest theories as the dominant paradigm, this paper investigates this development.