The International Accounting Standards Committee: A Political History starts in 1962 and covers the history of the IASC from its earliest days. The book looks at the human side of the organization's history, its institutional development, administrative policies and practices, its various constitutions and structures, in addition to charting the flow of its technical international accounting standard setting work through its various stages of development.

The history of the IASC is a remarkable story of response to felt needs, innovation, and ultimate success with the completion of its Core Standards Program and its subsequent endorsement by the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) and the European Union. From its early conception in the minds of Sir Henry Benson and his contemporaries to the adoption of the New Structure and Constitution in 2000, the history of the IASC is a remarkable triumph over obstacles, and a testament to the foresight and persistence of many dedicated accounting professionals over more than three decades of commitment of the idea of International Accounting Standards.

This is the story not only of an organization; it is the story of human beings with all their strengths and weaknesses. For the Chairmen, Secretaries-General, and Board members, it meant long Board meetings, discussing policy and Standards, in London, and major world cities. It meant hours of liaison activities with various international and national organizations, standard-setting bodies, the larger accounting firms, multinational corporate chief executives, and government officials. Theirs was the duty to spread the word about the IASC's mission and accomplishments, to win converts to the causes of harmonization and adoption of the Committee's Standards by nations and corporations in the interest of globally understandable accounting information and smoother cross-border listing and trading of securities

It meant long hours of seemingly endless revisions at night, often until the wee hours of the morning, closeted in someone's hotel suite, with agenda papers spread all over the bed and floor, as the Secretariat staff and Board technical observers struggled to implement the decisions of the Board. In the old days, before lap top computers, it meant portable typewriters, hand written insertions, and literally cutting and pasting. In more recent times, it meant tedious hours of typing at the laptop keyboard to generate the results established in the Board's guidelines. Through it all, the IASC Board and staff pushed the cause of global standards setting to its logical conclusion, a set of internationally acceptable accounting standards.