ABSTRACT
This chapter conceptualizes the business reality subject to accounting measurement, by drawing on pragmatic constructivism. The role of financial statements in the construction of social reality is to provide the informational basis necessary to support the financial markets' request for market economies to function. The chapter outlines criteria for accounting measurement validity by using the application of the performance measurement ideas of pragmatic constructivism to accounting. In doing this, the twin concepts of correspondence and coherence are established as underpinning measurement practice and the integration of the narrative linking measurement to action. The dimensions of pro-active truth and pragmatic truth are used to analyse the integration of the four dimensions of pragmatic constructivism and so establish an integrated learning based theory of truth. Finally, the chapter draws on the need for a learning theory of truth to establish trustworthiness in what are becoming increasingly hybrid accounting statements.
