Volume 26

The difficulties in engineering audit data verification lie in the evidence gap among on-site facts, contract rules, measurement and payment, and responsibility attribution. Blockchain and smart contracts provide new governance interfaces for this gap, but existing research is scattered in adjacent fields such as construction contract management and Audit 4.0, and has not yet formed a comprehensive explanation for engineering audit. Based on the PRISMA approach, this paper searches and screens relevant literature, combines the evidence mapping method, and reconstructs the knowledge structure of this field around “input of facts – translation of rules – execution of contracts – anchoring of evidence – audit feedback”. The study shows that the role of smart contracts in engineering audit is not to replace audit judgments, but to embed verifiable items in the project process, converting engineering quantities into traceable audit events. The literature also reveals that the real bottleneck does not lie in the chain-based evidence storage, but in whether the facts can be trusted to enter the contract, whether the contract rules can accommodate the engineering context, and whether the contract execution results can be recognized by the system. Based on this, this paper proposes a hierarchical mechanism framework and future research agenda for engineering audit data verification, emphasizing trusted oracles, BIM-IoT-chain integration, and privacy protection verification as the main lines of subsequent research.

In the context of the continuous digital transformation of education, teachers are increasingly expected to play leading roles in technology integration, pedagogical innovation, and relational coordination. However, existing studies on teachers’ digital leadership have largely been dominated by competency-based frameworks, policy-oriented analyses, and quantitative measurement models, with relatively limited attention paid to the cultural meanings embedded in everyday educational practice. From an anthropological perspective, teachers’ digital leadership is not merely a manifestation of technological competence or organizational function, but also a culturally situated process enacted through ritualized practice and symbolic interaction.Drawing on symbolic interactionism and ritual theory, this paper interprets teachers’ digital leadership in the educational field through typical scenes such as teaching-research activities, digital classroom teaching, and home-school collaboration. It argues that teachers’ digital leadership is constructed, performed, and recognized through repeated interaction, symbolic expression, and situational negotiation. Digital tools, professional discourse, and routine educational practices all function as symbolic resources through which teachers establish legitimacy, coordinate relationships, and shape professional identity. The study further reveals that digital leadership is deeply embedded in the cultural order of schooling, where authority is not simply granted by institutional position but continuously reproduced through meaningful social practice.By shifting the analytical focus from measurable competence to interpretive understanding, this paper expands the conceptualization of teachers’ digital leadership and offers a culturally grounded perspective for understanding digital educational reform. It also highlights the value of anthropological interpretation in uncovering the hidden meanings of educational change in everyday school life.

In the face of the severe global challenges posed by climate change, green development has become essential for corporate sustainability. Green mergers and acquisitions (M&A) serve as a pivotal strategy in this transformation. Drawing on signaling theory, this study investigates the effect of transition climate risk on green M&A, while also examining the moderating roles of government subsidies and investor attention. Using data from Chinese A-share listed companies over the period from 2013 to 2023, we apply logistic regression for empirical analysis. The results show that transition climate risk significantly drives green M&A activities, with government subsidies and investor attention further amplifying this effect. This study extends the application of signaling theory to the context of transition climate risk and green M&A, offering theoretical insights for both corporate strategy and policy development.

This work examines how limits in obtaining funds affect the degree to which firms use resources well in investment activities. The analysis follows a pattern that connects limits in funds to problems in information and costs from separation of control, and these factors relate to investment that occurs at levels that differ from what is appropriate. The argument suggests that limits in obtaining funds affect investment in ways that operate through limits in the amount of funds, the time that funds are available, and the cost of funds, and these limits reduce investment that would produce value. The work also shows that changes involving digital methods, release of information on data that firms control, approaches to funds that support environmental aims, and protections from institutions can make the degree to which investment is appropriate higher through making information better in quality, making oversight from outside the firm stronger, and making the distribution of funds work better.

Blockchain is rapidly proliferating a profound transformation across accounting and auditing. This paper offers an integrative review of its principal streams of influence. From an accounting information systems perspective, blockchain alters the design of information recording, storage, and processing through a distributed-ledger enabled triple-entry bookkeeping and embedding automated control over business processes through the use of smart contracts. As regards auditing, the a