دانلود رایگان مقاله انگلیسی حسابداری و جنبش های اجتماعی: اکتشاف پارتیشن حسابداری حیاتی - الزویر 2016

abstract

A central tenet of critical accounting research maintains the need to challenge and change existing social relations; moving towards a more emancipated and equitable social order. The question of how critical accounting research upholds this principle has been intermittentlydiscussed. Thispaper aims to engage with, andfurther,thisdiscussionby contributing to research linking accounting information to social movements. The paper reviews the literature on accounting and social movements, central to which is the work of Gallhofer and Haslam; using their work as a departure point we discussion the nature of accounting information and focus on social movement unionism (SMU). Drawing on Bakhtinian dialogics and classical Marxism we develop an alternative theoretical framework to analyse an example of accounting information and social movements, covering a trade union pay dispute. The paper concludes with a discussion of the class nature of accounting information, including an exploration of the implications for accounting praxis and agency in the struggles for an emancipated world. The paper builds on the limited amount of existing work in this area; exploring the ‘class belongingness’ of accounting information and developing an understanding which can help guide the praxis of critical accounting researchers.

6. Conclusion

This paper has been inspired by the struggles of campaigners and trade unionists, as well as the work of Gallhofer and Haslam (2003, 2006).We have argued thatitis the combination of accounting and social movements that,to borrow Gallhofer and Haslam’s terms, better aligns accounting with emancipation. In large part, this paper has sought to illustrate their work in the context of a contemporary trade union dispute. This culminates in seeing agency beyond the ranks of the academics (including critical accountants) and in the social movements including mobilising accounting information. This utilisation of accounting information was not pursue on the basis of trying to establish a ‘real’ dialogue with the VC; we think such an outcome is not possible under the current social relations. In part this is because accounting information is imbued with capitalist/managerial priorities, as Ogden and Bougen (1985) and Owen and Lloyd (1985) have argued. But also because social movements (including organised labour) do not have, nor ever will have, enough counter-hegemonic force to develop their own alternative accounts that will gain widespread support within capitalist social relations. This argument brings us to the position where to change accounting we have to change capitalism, not the other way round.

To reach such an unambiguous conclusion it is necessary to reject the formulation of accounting information as having no necessary class belongingness. Instead accounting information is seen as being integral to capitalism, information produced by capitalists for capitalists. However, capitalism is a complex and contradictory system and so the information it relies upon can be used by social movements to challenge existing exploitation and oppressions. It has been argued that a more appropriate theoretical framework within which to see this is provided by a Bakhtinian analysis of language and a classical Marxist understanding of society.