Accounting, Society and the Environment (ASE)

A big thank you to all of the presenters and attendees at the Accounting, Society and the Environment (ASE) research network held on the 8th May 2019 held at the University of Aberdeen, sponsored by the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA). It was great to meet up with old friends and to welcome some new participants to the network. We had 60 attendees, 7 research posters and 14 research papers that investigated the social impact of accounting from a variety of perspectives in NGO's, public and third sectors in Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Italy, UK, Greece, Nigeria and New Zealand giving the workshop a truly international perspective.

The first session began with Rakshitha Hitibandara and Chandana Alawattage’s paper on organisational politics and sustainability reports and in less developed countries. This was followed by an investigation into organisational culture and corporate sustainability by Bedanand Upadhaya. This theme continued with Matthew Scobie’s discussion of grounded accountability in the pursuit of determination that highlighted how accountability prioritises obligations between people and place across generations and privileges indigenous agency through (d)evolution. The lack of uniformity in social reporting was further exemplified by Patrizia Gazzola’s web analysis of social responsibility and Italian listed companies.

Suzana Grubnic led us into further discussions of accountability in the second session. This session considered how organisations such as health, social care, state-controlled organisations and public sector organisations construct and discharge their accountability obligations effectively or not. Indeed, the work of Paul Ahn on changes to the BBC’s governance structure and accountability practices and Diane Koan’s investigation into the social and environmental programmes in the public sector indicate that some fundamental institutional problems remain as barriers to effective accountability practices.

Over lunch, we had the opportunity to discuss a variety of research projects all with some form of social impact which reinforced the need for increased accountability and transparency of organisational practice to meet the current drive towards sustainability.

The lunch also provided a good networking opportunity. Ideas on how to move forward with our research network and potential research topics were also debated. Points of discussion included how accounting etc. contributes to policy debates and policy evaluation of sustainability practices and various social developments. The role of social accounting in enhancing organisation-stakeholder interactions and the impact of corporate governance mechanisms on shaping social accounting practices were also debated.

In the third session, Tarikul Islam introduced the concept of hybrid corporations and the business case for the for-profit social enterprise which if successful would be a significant step towards resolving the unsustainability of social-minded organisations. The potential power of social impact reporting as a new organisational practice was put forward by Julia Morley. In particular, Julia demonstrated the characteristics of network ties observed in the case of social investment are not consistent with the taxonomy of network ties developed by scholars addressing the networked diffusion of new organisational practices. The complexity of constructing accounting for social outcomes and impact was shown by Jane Gibbon and Colin Dey to be problematic and a bit of a dance to meet these objectives. This was emphasised in Stelio Kotsias’s discussion of the Visual Arts Centre of Richmond (VisArts), a non-profit arts education centre, struggling to uncover hidden cost drivers and applying ABC in an attempt to manage the organisation in pursuit of its social mission more effectively.

Our last session of the day by Martyn Gordon and Sisi Zou, Sonja Gallhofer and Catriona Paisey considered the emancipatory potential of accounting in terms of mobilising accountability and alternative accounts which are anticipated to be particularly useful in the current global context where legislation such as the proposed EU Directive for public country by country reporting is being considered to address social concerns and corporate accountability. 

Our final paper of the day diverged from the central theme of the day but nevertheless covered a vital aspect of academic work that we as academics seeking to publish and share our knowledge need to be aware of. Ken Weir’s paper demonstrated the dominance of commercial publishers in the arena of academic journal publication and emphasises the dangers to academic freedom and institutional predicaments that limit activist agency which affects us all. The controversial nature of this paper and the importance of intellectual freedom and knowledge transfer led the scientific committee to award the ASE Best Paper Prize to Ken Weir.

It was evident from the day’s discussions and debate that despite the consensus on the importance of social accounting being embedded within organisations finding a meaningful and consistent way to measure and report on such social issues still represents a fundamental challenge to organisations. Indeed, establishing what works in different contexts and understanding the interactions and interdependencies between different interventions is relatively under-researched and poorly understood.

As such topics suggested for the next workshop include, but are not limited to:

• The challenges and benefits of sustainability reporting and performance measurement in public and third sector organisation.
• Sustainability and social impact measurement - why does it matter?
• Governing by numbers: social audits and tales of corruption.
• The use of misuse of accounting information.
• The role accounting, accountability and governance systems in the management of trust and legitimation.

Finally, I would like to thank Rebecca McCaffry and CIMA for their financial support for the workshop.
Thanks also go to Akira Yonekura, Vicky Lambert and Zam Zam for assisting with the organisation and preparations for the workshop and to Ulrike Marx, Mo Sherif and Bill Jackson for chairing the sessions.

I would also like to thank all the presenters and attendees for their support and encouragement to develop the research network further. For those looking for an outlet for their papers, the Sustainability Accounting, Management and Policy Journal indicated an interest in the papers listed on our schedule.
The journal weblink is https://www.emeraldinsight.com/loi/sampj

The next workshop will take place at the University of Aberdeen on Wednesday 6th May 2020. I hope to see you all next year.