IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eme/aaajpp/aaaj-05-2015-2047.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Accounting for madness: the “Real Casa dei Matti” of Palermo 1824-1860

Author

Listed:
  • Warwick Funnell
  • Valerio Antonelli
  • Raffaele D’Alessio
  • Roberto Rossi

Abstract

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to understand the role played by accounting in managing an early nineteenth century lunatic asylum in Palermo, Italy. Design/methodology/approach - The paper is informed by Foucault’s studies of lunatic asylums and his work on governmentality which gave prominence to the role of statistics, the “science of the State”. Findings - This paper identifies a number of roles played by accounting in the management of the lunatic asylum studied. Most importantly, information which formed the basis of accounting reports was used to describe, classify and give visibility and measurability to the “deviance” of the insane. It also legitimated the role played by lunatic asylums, as entrusted to them in post-Napoleonic early nineteenth century society, and was a tool to mediate with the public authorities to provide adequate resources for the institution to operate. Research limitations/implications - This paper encourages accounting scholars to engage more widely with socio-historical research that will encompass organisations such as lunatic asylums. Originality/value - This paper provides, for the first time, a case of accounting applied to a lunatic asylum from a socio-historical perspective.

Suggested Citation

  • Warwick Funnell & Valerio Antonelli & Raffaele D’Alessio & Roberto Rossi, 2017. "Accounting for madness: the “Real Casa dei Matti” of Palermo 1824-1860," Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 30(5), pages 1111-1141, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:eme:aaajpp:aaaj-05-2015-2047
    DOI: 10.1108/AAAJ-05-2015-2047
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/AAAJ-05-2015-2047/full/html?utm_source=repec&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=repec
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers
    File URL: https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/AAAJ-05-2015-2047/full/pdf?utm_source=repec&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=repec
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1108/AAAJ-05-2015-2047?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Papi, Luca & Bigoni, Michele & Deidda Gagliardo, Enrico & Funnell, Warwick, 2019. "Accounting for power and resistance: The University of Ferrara under the Fascist regime in Italy," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 59-76.
    2. Bigoni, Michele & Antonelli, Valerio & Cafaro, Emanuela Mattia & D'Alessio, Raffaele & Funnell, Warwick, 2020. "Accounting for the ‘deviant’ in 19th century Italian prisons," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    3. Funnell, Warwick & Antonelli, Valerio & D'Alessio, Raffaele, 2019. "Accounting and psychiatric power in Italy: The royal insane hospital of Turin in the 19th century," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 1-21.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eme:aaajpp:aaaj-05-2015-2047. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Emerald Support (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.