Volume one of the ''Handbooks of Management Accounting Research'' sets the context for both Handbooks, with three chapters outlining the historical development of management accounting as a discipline and as a practice in three broad geographic settings. The bulk of the first volume then draws together a series of contributions that analyse the scholarly literature in terms of distinct intellectual and theoretical social science perspectives. The volume includes a chapter which looks at work informed by psychology as a base discipline. The volume also includes a set of chapters that seek to evaluate and explain issues of research method for the different approaches to research found within management accounting. It documents the scholarly management accounting literature.