Comparative International Governmental Accounting Research

CIGAR is a network of academics researching governmental accounting, whose primary purpose is to encourage comparison across national boundaries. In this, ‘governmental accounting’ is widely defined to include all governmental entities (at transnational, national, regional and local levels) and to cover budgeting, accounting, financial reporting and auditing.

To date, CIGAR has taken three specific forms. First, the network has held Biennial Conferences since 1987. These conferences are open to anyone to offer papers and attend, or to attend without offering a paper; the conferences have been a mix of academics and practitioners. Second, the network has held Biennial Workshops since 1992. The workshops are by invitation and are generally restricted to a small group of academics. Many of these conferences and workshops have produced collections of papers in the form of books and issues of academic journals. And third, the network has carried out a project to compare the government budgeting and accounting systems in nine European countries (Euro-CIGAR study), the product of which was an edited book. 

CIGAR is managed by the academics who have hosted the conferences and workshops, namely: Rowan Jones (Chair) (University of Birmingham; r.jones@bham.ac.uk); Aad Bac (University of Tilburg; a.d.bac@uvt.nl); Dietrich Budaeus (University of Hamburg; BudaeusD@hwp-hamburg.de); Ernst Buschor (buschor@ethrat.ch); Eugenio Caperchione (University of Modena, and Bocconi University; Eugenio.caperchione@uni-bocconi.it); James Chan (University of Illinois at Chicago; jimchan@uic.edu); Susana Jorge (University of Coimbra; susjor@fe.uc.pt); Evelyne Lande (University of Poitiers; elande@iae.univ-poitiers.fr); Frode Mellemvik (Bodø Graduate School of Business; frode.mellemvik@hibo.no); Norvald Monsen (Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration; norvald.monsen@nhh.no); Vicente Montesinos (University of Valencia; Vicente.montesinos@uv.es); Riccardo Mussari (University of Siena; mussari@unisi.it); Salme Näsi (University of Tampere; salme.nasi@uta.fi); Kuno Schedler (University of St. Gallen; kuno.schedler@unisg.ch); Jean-Claude Scheid (Conservatoire des Arts et Metiers; scheid@cnam.fr); José-Manuel Vela (vela_josema@gva.es).

CIGAR was founded, de facto, in 1987 by James Chan, Rowan Jones and Klaus Lüder (lueder@dhv-speyer.de). In 1999, we established a Chairman of the network, which was held by Klaus Lüder until he retired from his chair in Speyer in 2003.