Professor Murray Wells AO

Emeritus Professor Murray Wells AO FASSA

MCom (Canterbury), PhD (Sydney)

Discipline: Accounting, auditing and accountability

Year Elected: 1984

After I graduated from the University of Canterbury with a Master of Economics degree in 1964, I felt a need to further my studies and was appointed to a lectureship at the University of Sydney.  I arrived in Sydney in May 1967 and enrolled in the PhD program the following year.  I was the first to complete a PhD in Accounting at the University of Sydney and had the very good fortune of having Professor Ray Chambers (a Fellow of the Academy) as my thesis Supervisor.  My thesis was published by the University of Illinois and won “the Hourglass Award” of the Academy of Accounting Historians” in 1979.

Despite some tempting offers and with no regrets, I remained at the University of Sydney for the rest of my academic career.  At that time, the “Sydney School of Accounting” enjoyed a world-wide reputation for its academic rigour and its support for a revolutionary style of accounting: “Continuously Contemporary Accounting”.  It is indeed gratifying to witness the accounting profession around the world currently switching to “Fair Value Accounting” which follows closely, the prescription developed by Chambers. I also worked with Chambers as an Assistant Editor of Abacus, Australia’s international journal of Accounting, and became Editor in 1977.

I was invited to assist with the planning of the World Congress of Accounting Education and Research in Kyoto in 1984 and subsequently served as President of the organising body – The International Association for Accounting Education and Research for five years.  During that time the IAAER expanded to represent academic accountants throughout the world.  I was the International Distinguished Visiting Lecturer of the American Accounting Association in 1986 and Outstanding International Accounting Educator in 1995.

I was instrumental in the formation of the University of Sydney Accounting Foundation in 1982 which became the vehicle for supporting accounting research at Sydney, especially support of two Sydney initiatives – the Sydney University Pacioli Society (formed by Chambers and me in in 1968), and as Editor of Abacus from 1975-1994 (I have been a Consulting Editor of the journal up to the present). The former provided a national networking forum of practitioners and academics facilitating practical reforms to accounting, while the latter, now the fourth oldest continuous international accounting journal, provided a forum for exposing those practical-based reforms worldwide.

I was greatly honoured to be admitted to the Academy of the Social Sciences in 1984. I appreciate, especially, the diversity of its membership, which provides strength to its common purpose while accommodating a wide range of disciplines.