Literature Positioning (aos-literature-positioning)

When to trigger

• The front end reviews literatures without joining any specific conversation
• Reviewers could ask "why does this belong in AOS rather than a management or sociology journal?"
• Citations cluster in a sibling journal's canon (JAR/TAR earnings-quality chains, AMJ theory-building chains)
• You cannot name the two or three prior papers your findings push against

Position inside AOS's own 50-year canon

AOS is unusual: half a century of its own archive defines the conversations it cares about, and its editors read submissions against that archive. Locate the specific AOS thread your paper extends:

Thread (examples from the canon)	You must engage it if your paper is about…
Roles of accounting beyond the textbook — Burchell et al. (1980); Hopwood (1983)	any claim that accounting does unexpected work
Accounting, power and the calculable person — Miller & O'Leary (1987)	costing, performance measurement, discipline
Accountability in everyday organizational life — Roberts & Scapens (1985)	how systems shape conduct and self-accounts
Budgets as political instruments — Covaleski & Dirsmith (1986)	budgeting, resource struggles, institutional pressure
Numbers as inscriptions and constructed reality — Hines (1988); Robson (1992); Chua (1995)	measurement, representation, expertise
Culture change through accounting — Dent (1991)	field studies of transformation
Control systems and strategy — Simons (1990)	management control design in use
Behavioral/JDM synthesis — Libby, Bloomfield & Nelson (2002)	experimental financial-accounting work
Risk and audit society — Power (2009)	risk management, auditability, regulation

(Full verified references: resources/exemplars/library.md.)

Engage the interdisciplinary sources honestly

AOS conversations run on imported theory. Cite the primary social-science sources your tradition uses (e.g., the sociology behind institutional theory; Foucault for governmentality; Latour for inscriptions; the cognitive/social psychology behind a JDM design) as they are used in accounting — showing you know both the origin and the accounting appropriation. A paper that cites only accounting journals signals thin theorizing; one that cites only sociology signals the wrong venue.

Mark the delta

• Name the two or three nearest prior papers and state, in one sentence each, what they established and what your paper changes.
• Write the delta as a conceptual advance ("shows the mechanism is X, where prior work assumed Y"), never as inventory ("extends the literature on…").
• Anticipate the misclassification risk: say explicitly why the paper is an accounting paper and not general organization theory — the accounting practice must be analytically central, not incidental scenery.
• Disclose and differentiate your own related work in anonymized form ("prior research (Author, 20xx)").

Structure of a positioned front end

1. The phenomenon and its stake (one or two paragraphs, concrete).
2. The AOS conversation and its current settled view.
3. The crack in that view — anomaly, silence, or contradiction.
4. Your question, lens, and setting as the way through the crack.
5. Preview of the conceptual answer and its consequence for the conversation.

Checklist

• One specific AOS thread identified; its key papers engaged substantively
• Primary interdisciplinary sources cited alongside their accounting uses
• Nearest two or three papers named, with a one-sentence delta against each
• The accounting practice is analytically central in the framing
• Own related work disclosed neutrally, without breaking anonymity
• No citation blocks that a reviewer could delete without loss

Anti-patterns

• Gap-spotting: "little is known about…" with no live disagreement at stake.
• Canon tourism: citing Burchell et al. and Miller & O'Leary ritually while arguing with neither.
• Wrong-canon drift: building the front end on JAR/TAR measurement debates AOS readers do not share.
• Sociology without accounting: the imported theory is centered while the accounting practice is a backdrop.

Output format

【Thread】the AOS conversation entered; key papers ...
【Settled view】what that conversation currently believes ...
【Crack】the anomaly / silence / contradiction ...
【Delta】vs nearest papers 1 / 2 / 3 — one sentence each ...
【Interdisciplinary base】primary sources + their accounting appropriation ...
【Next step】aos-methods