This column explores a much-needed book that examines DEI in accounting from the European perspective. All too often, DEI in accounting is presented in subtext as monolithic across all locales. But Alessandro Ghio, associate professor of diversity and social accounting at the ESCP Business School, and his fellow authors’ new book, Diversity and Equity in Accounting: Emerging Issues, Challenges and Opportunities, refutes this assertion, instead showing that different aspects of diversity and inclusion predominate in different jurisdictions and contexts. While race and racism underpin much of what is termed DEI work in the United States, it is gender that stands front and center across much of Europe (M. Ferree, “Framing Equality: The Politics of Race, Class, Gender in the US, Germany, and the Expanding European Union,” Semantic Scholar, 2007, https://tinyurl.com/2uc2y8c9). To this end, legislators across the European Union have made much progress, enshrining many policies in law, while such matters are, at best, still being debated in the United States. Yet, as Ghio points out in this book, much work remains to bring race, sexuality, and even neurodiversity to the fore in Europe. This is in contrast to the situation in the United States, with its complicated relationship with race and racism, past and present. What follows is a brief synopsis of a timely and much-needed work that answers this call and moves beyond it.
The book Diversity and Equity in Accounting–Emerging Issues, Challenges and Opportunities (edited by Marisa Agostini, Valentina Berretta, Maria Chiara Demartini, Alessandro Ghio, and Sara Trucco, Springer, 2025) is the result of an ambitious collective effort involving 54 authors. The volume is structured around five main topics: 1) the state of the art of diversity and equity in accounting; 2) trends in reporting and disclosure of diversity and equity practices adopted by firms; 3) organizational challenges related to diversity and equity; 4) case studies; and 5) diversity and equity in university governance and education. Taken together, they offer a rich over-view of how diversity and equity work from a European perspective.
At the heart of the book lies a shared concern with equity as fairness in accounting, across academia, and throughout the profession. This approach to the idea of accounting highlights that equity is not merely a matter of representation or outcomes, but also one of processes, tools, and knowledge assumptions. In concrete terms, chapters explore how barriers within accounting can be identified and dismantled. For instance, several contributions examine the current and potential impact of artificial intelligence on gender disparities in task allocation, raising critical questions about whether new technologies mitigate or perpetuate existing inequalities. Other chapters address the need to account for differentiated social and historical contexts—for example, by revisiting how the automaker Fiat (now Stellantis) implemented welfare support for employees in the 1960s and how such practices were accounted for. Other contributions focus on the creation of more just outcomes, for example by analysing disclosure processes related to social equity in municipalities or B Corps (for more about B Corporations, see https://tinyurl.com/bdzfwvmz).
The substantive content is extremely timely in light of ongoing debates on diversity, equity, and inclusion in organizations and in the accounting field more globally. The book is also important for what it reveals about European collective academic and industry organizing—more specifically Italian academia, as almost all contributors are untenured scholars based in Italy, for whom authoring a book chapter typically carries limited weight in tenure and promotion decisions, especially within a national evaluation system widely described as harsh and journal-metric driven (R. Spanò, E. Bracci, F. Manes-Rossi, and V. Sforza, “A Fatally Efficient Machine. Insights into the ‘Banality’ of the Research Evaluation Exercise in Italy,” Critical Perspectives on Accounting, v. 100, p.102742, 2024). As Galizzi et al. further note, patriarchal structures persist in Italian academia, and many early-career scholars, particularly women and marginalized academics, experience isolation and significant career challenges (G. Galizzi, K. McBride, and B. Siboni, “Patriarchy Persists: Experiences of Barriers to Women’s Career Progression in Italian Accounting Academia,” Critical Perspectives on Accounting, v.99, p.102625, 2024).
Against this backdrop, the book grew out of the creation of a national working group on equity and inclusion in accounting in Italy. This group first met in person in Rome in 2023, bringing together more than 60 participants. That initial workshop provided a space for collective reflection, mutual support, and intellectual exchange, and ultimately sparked the idea of developing a book that could give visibility and legitimacy to research on diversity and equity in accounting. The response exceeded all expectations: the editors were overwhelmed by chapter proposals and ultimately selected 42. Contributors actively engaged in a rigorous peer-review process and participated in disseminating the book within their respective academic and professional networks.
This collective effort illustrates the potential of organizing around shared commitments to social justice and equity. It shows how academic and professional communities can mobilize to challenge exclusionary structures and dominant evaluative regimes, and how scholarship can be oriented toward supporting social change rather than merely reproducing the status quo. In this sense, the book aligns with broader calls to rethink the purposes and practices of accounting in both the academy and industry to reclaim its emancipatory potential (D. Lindebaum, “Hope,” Academy of Management Learning & Education, vol. 24, no. 2, pp.141–148, Apr. 23, 2025, https://doi.org/10.5465/amle.2025.0145).
From a wider perspective, a second, salient aspect concerns the locally embedded nature of diversity debates. A strong focus throughout the book is placed on gender-related issues, including female representation on boards, gender budgeting, women’s leadership in accounting and business, gender equality plans, and the gender pay gap. This emphasis reflects, to a significant extent, the Italian context in which most contributors are based, where increasing women’s participation in the labor market and their representation in senior positions remains a central societal and policy concern.
In the authors’ experience working across several countries, this also highlights how diversity discussions are shaped by local histories, institutions, and social struggles. In Australia, for example, discussions of diversity in accounting and organizations often foreground Indigenous Peoples. In Canada, debates tend to focus on both Indigenous Peoples and Francophone representation. In France, issues of socioeconomic inequality, particularly across urban areas and regions, are especially salient. In the United States, diversity debates are frequently centred on race and ethnicity. These different focal points can influence business practices, academic research agendas, and forms of societal engagement.
It is important to avoid framing diversity dimensions as competing priorities, wherein attention to one dimension necessarily sidelines others. Instead, it implicitly invites readers to see these local emphases as opportunities for cross-fertilization. Knowledge and experience developed in relation to one diversity dimension or context can bring to the fore overlooked issues else-where, fostering more inclusive and nuanced understandings of equity in accounting across borders.
In conclusion, Diversity and Equity in Accounting—Emerging Issues, Challenges and Opportunities represents an important contribution to accounting debates, both substantively and symbolically. It highlights that meaningful progress toward social justice and equity in accounting requires attention to how diversity is measured, reported, and governed, and also to everyday practices within the profession and academia itself. While the book shows that important efforts have already been made, it equally points to the fact that much remains to be done, and that such work is most powerful when undertaken collectively. At a global level, these efforts open up possibilities for cross-pollination across areas of expertise and knowledge, both in terms of organizational practices, such as diversity initiatives implemented in accounting offices in Melbourne, Dallas, or Shanghai, as well as in terms of scholarly dialogue among academics working in the United States, Africa, Europe, and beyond. By bringing together diverse perspectives and calling for more voices to join this reflection, this volume offers hope that accounting scholarship and practitioners can move beyond dominant constructs and play a constructive role in supporting social justice and equity at both the local and global level.
