Laura Maran is an Associate Professor in Management Accounting at the University of Trento (Italy). As former Deputy Head (of School) Research and Innovation at RMIT University (Australia), in 2018-19 she contributed to driving the agenda of next-generation research topics in the interdisciplinary qualitative accounting. Her research seeks to contextualise contemporary public sector management practices by using accounting history to identify the legacy of earlier reforms. This work shows, often for the first time, how a historical perspective on the field of New Public Management can provide new ways to examine contemporary public policy. It also allows scholars and policy-makers to evaluate the economic and social outcomes of public sector reforms, where accounting has an ideological, political and ethical instrumentality. Laura is joint editor of Accounting History, editorial board member of Auditing & Accountability Journal (AAAJ) and she publishes in AAAJ, FAM, BAR and CPA, among others, focusing on different types of public organizations. She is the recipient of research excellence awards, including the nomination to Australia’s economic history field leader (2019) and the Robert W. Gibson Award (2024).