Brave New Risks: Tracing the evolution of actuarial research from the Accounting & Finance Review to the frontiers of Actuarial Science

This article aimed to examine the thematic evolution and methodological trajectory of research on Actuarial Science in the Accounting & Finance Review (A&FR), to assess its main intellectual contributions, and to shed light on promising avenues for future research. Despite its relevance, research on Actuarial Science in Brazil has remained fragmented, with limited integration between traditional pension studies and emerging domains such as insurance analytics, climate finance, and risk management. No prior study in Brazil has systematically mapped these developments or articulated a unified research agenda linking Actuarial Science to Finance, Accounting, and Sustainability. By documenting the A&FR’s historical contribution and outlining future directions, this study advances the understanding of how research on Actuarial Science can address new societal and regulatory challenges. It shows the discipline’s potential to strengthen public policy, enhance financial resilience, and support evidence-based regulation. This article positions the A&FR as a key platform for publishing papers on Actuarial Science in Latin America and proposes a forward-looking agenda that connects Brazilian research to international trends, fostering collaboration, interdisciplinarity, and greater global visibility for the field. A qualitative, longitudinal review of all A&FR articles related to Actuarial Science (2006-2025) was conducted. The analysis combined bibliographic mapping, thematic classification, and methodological assessment to identify dominant topics, emerging trends, and structural research gaps. This article offers a comprehensive historical mapping of actuarial research published in the A&FR from 2006 to 2025, analyzing 47 articles. The findings reveal a consistent focus on social security and pension sustainability, complemented in recent years by diversification toward insurance and financial risks, solvency, and regulation. The paper highlights the growing methodological sophistication of actuarial studies and identifies emerging research frontiers (e.g., health insurance, climate and cyber risks, and International Financial Reporting Standards-based solvency frameworks) that connect Actuarial Science to global debates on financial stability and sustainability.

Keywords:
Actuarial Science; insurance; pensions; finance; risk management