Abstract

This paper reviews the accounting and management literatures relating to intellectual capital. It identifies anddiscusses the major milestones in the intellectual capital (IC) reporting movement and significant contributionspromoting external reporting of IC. It was identified that with a view to enabling organisations provide a clearunderstanding of firm value creation several national and supranational institutions have produced guidelinesand frameworks for externally reporting IC. In many cases regulators, the accounting profession and accountingscholars have driven these initiatives. Although IC reporting has been identified as an important aspect ofreporting not only in large corporates but also in small and medium enterprises and in the not-for-profit sectorthe existing guidelines for reporting of IC have not been embraced by organisations. Possible future directionsfor IC reporting are proposed.

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