ABSTRACT
The aim of this chapter is to explore the interrelationships between accounting and taxation with a view to framing research questions which bring taxation clearly into view in accounting history scholarship. The chapter traces taxation themes through several strands of accounting history scholarship and through scholarly publications in which taxation is sometimes, but not always, the explicit research focus. The exercise consists of a review of how accounting historians study taxation and how the historical influences of taxation are addressed by accounting scholars with more contemporary concerns. Concluding comments focus on challenges facing the accounting historian of taxation. These include strengthening connections between historical questions of taxation and other fields of accounting history and linking such research to histories of taxation by historians operating in other sub-fields. The chapter emphasises US and British tax accounting history. This is a practical, not a principled, matter. While research on other parts of the world will be discussed, the author focuses on work published in English.
