The paper by Friederike Wall and Stephan Leitner is published in the Journal of Management Accounting Research (2021), 33 (3): 189-212. The paper can also be accessed here.
Abstract: Agent-based computational economics (ACE)—while adopted comparably widely in other domains of managerial science—is a rather novel paradigm for management accounting research (MAR). This paper provides an overview of opportunities and difficulties that ACE may have for research in management accounting and, in particular, introduces a framework that researchers in management accounting may employ when considering ACE as a paradigm for their particular research endeavor. The framework builds on the two interrelated paradigmatic elements of ACE: a set of theoretical assumptions on economic agents and the approach of agent-based modeling. Particular focus is put on contrasting opportunities and difficulties of ACE in comparison to other research methods employed in MAR.