Study Of The Legal Responsibility Of The Certified Public Accountant

This thesis consists of four chapters. The first chapter deals with the basic issues such as responsibilities, auditing responsibilities, accoUntability, auditing relations, legal relations of auditing and so on, which must be referred to in the researching legal liabilities of CPAs. The author classifies auditing responsibilities into professional responsibility and legal liabilities. And also the author considers that the reason appearance of the professional responsibility is certain while the other is not, which is one major that causes CPAs and CPA firms to shoulder legal liabilities because of their failure to perform professional responsibility properly. The legal liabilities is the social force urging CPAs to perform their professional responsibility effectively. Considering the close relationship between auditing and accountability, the author approaches the development of auditing relations and auditing responsibility during that of accountability. With accountability抯 expansion, the auditing responsibility is increasingly strengthened and the auditing relations determine that of auditing subject抯 responsibility to auditing objects, meanwhile they form the basic content of auditing legal relations. Auditing legal relation is a kind of social relation which is stipulated and regulated by auditing laws and regulations and consists of rights and obligations of parties concerning auditing. The second chapter concentrates on the five basic issues in CPAs?legal liability system which includes subjects and objects of CPAs?legal liabilities doctrine of liability fixation constitutive elements and deference method. CPA firms and CPAs are the main subjects of auditing legal liabilities and under some particular cases, the auditing parties concerned may also become subjects. There exists three forms in CPAs?legal liabilities: administrative, civil and criminal liabilities. Nowadays there are two kinds of CPA firms: limited and partnership firms. The latter is more popular because the partners have unlimited joint liability for the firms?debts. Recently, in order to adequately reflect intermediaries?responsibilities to the society and at the same time to reasonably protect partners?interests, a new organization form called limited partnership firm in foreign countries appears, which is creative and beneficial attempt. The most difficult problem in handling CPAs?legal liabilities?objects is how to identify the third party and liability scope of it. And the most important problem of CPAs?civil liabilities is that of doctrine of liability fixation. According to the situation in our country, the author believes, the malpractice principle should be applied in tackling this kind of lawsuits. Harmful behaviors, harmful facts, subjective faults in practice, cause and effect relations between damage and the audited financial statements, which are relied by somebody to make some decisions, are the four necessary factors for CPAs to accept civil liabilities, otherwise CPAs concerned can protest. In the third chapter, having briefly introduced the development process of CPAs? legal liabilities both in America and in China, the author comparatively studied the situation in the two countries and arrived at some beneficial enlightenments. Then the author discusses the theoretical basis of CPAs?legal liabilities and subjective and objective causes which have made CPAs to shoulder legal liabilities in modern ~ocial, political and economic environment. The author divide...