Accountancy in Germany;

              82 HASKINS & SELLS November
Accountancy In Germany
BY E. A . KRACKE, Resident Partner, Berlin, Germany
WH E N I began to revolve the topic
of this paper in mind, the question
of where to begin presented itself—
whether with accountancy as a science or
with accountancy as a profession—and
the answer came naturally enough, begin
at the beginning; in other words, the de­scription
of the creator explains the status
of the creation. Briefly stated, the pro­fession
in Germany has not attained, either
in point of the respect it commands on the
part of the general public or its record of
professional or technical accomplishment,
the status it has reached in America. But
I believe I can truthfully say that the in­dividual
members of it are aware of its
shortcomings and desirous of making
progress. I stress the individual members
because in my view, the most serious
trouble with the profession lies in the form
of organization or affiliation of the organ­ized
groups engaged in active practice.
By far the bulk of the practice is in the
hands of corporations which are owned
by, and therefore subservient to, the finan­cial
institutions of the country. This
proprietary relationship, of course, robs
the practitioner of that independence
which is vitally necessary for professional
progress; it subordinates him to the views
of those in financial control of many of the
country's industries, and has brought
about the existing condition in which pub­lished
financial reports do not command
the degree of confidence that they do with
us. Freedom of effective expression of
thought is vitally necessary in any busi­ness
relationship if progress is not to be
hindered. I have a very optimistic con­fidence,
however, in the mental calibre of
the men engaged in the practice of the pro­fession
in Germany as well as of those who
labor in the field of accountancy instruc­tion.
I believe that, with the example
before them of what has been done here
as well as in Great Britain, they will
measure up to the task confronting them.
Coming to the phase of the subject deal­ing
with accountancy as a science—or per­haps
it would be better to speak of it as
an art, since it relates to the application
of accounting principles in corporation
practice—we find an interesting situation.
As far as concerns the detail work, it is in
the main very well done. Books are well
kept and particular stress is laid on their