Glen Lehman

Disclosing new worlds: a role for social and environmental accounting and auditing

Abstract This essay critically analyses modern social and environmental accounting. First, I argue that modern social and environmental accounting models have been developed based on procedural liberal frameworks that limit the proposals for reform. Second, social and environmental accounting focuses on the corporation as the accounting entity and mistakenly claims to be able to influence it. In developing another way to think and act about the environmental and social role of accounting, I consider whether modern communitarian thought can enrich the democratic process. The aim is to foster debate and dialogue concerning the role of corporations and their impact on nature. I argue that implicit in communitarian theory is a democratic model through which language acts as a means to critically focus on the direction of accounting as an institution in the public sphere.

Accounting for war

Abstract This paper examines the ways in which accounting has helped to rationalize and normalize violence and how this has contributed to the acceleration and expansion of war. It is argued that accounting is a product of the “social imaginary” of modernity which projects a brutal attitude towards others by instrumentalizing relationships. Accounting’s reliance on instrumental rationality and economic efficiency provides the ideological justification for destroying the environment and others. Accounting’s role in perpetrating war and warlike behaviors is demonstrated in relation to our war with the environment, the expansionistic logic of capitalism, dehumanization and distance, globalization, the silent war of economic sanctions and the extent to which war is good for business.

Analyzing the quality, meaning and accountability of organizational reporting and communication: Directions for future research

Abstract The aim of this paper is to promote further research that analyzes the quality, meaning and accountability of organizational reporting and corporate communication. These issues are critical if accounting is to satisfy its role by providing information to the public. In this paper, we conclude this special issue by reiterating the potential for research that takes interpretive and qualitative approaches, in their various guises, to the study of organizational reporting and communication. We briefly outline this growing field of research and then highlight the areas where we believe future research is needed. In doing so, we draw on Thompson’s (1990) tripartite framework. This paper provides an overview of some of the avenues for future research, which will hopefully encourage and guide researchers in this area.

Social and environmental accounting: trends and thoughts for the future

Over the yearsAccounting Forum has explored different possible directions for the field of social and environmental accounting. With a new publisher— Elsevier—it is our hope that we shall reach new markets and opportunities. In recent issues, these explorations have been extended to theorising the role of accounting in transnational global processes, and to the channels of global information and the interpretation of that information. In particular, contributions have attempted to explore the notion that accounting discourse is a medium through which relationships between business and society can be created, nurtured and developed. In our 2000 issue, we expressed our guiding aim through the lens provided by the late Professor Ray Chambers. We repeat it for this issue:

Interpretive accounting research

Recent accounting research has begun to utilise resources from the art of interpretation as developed in the recent social science literature. This area of research is gaining prominence, taking the form of case-study and archival research. Interpretivist accounting research challenges the purpose of disclosure and invites accounting to provide additional resources for structuring an interpretivist position taken to facilitate “critical” interventions (Arrington & Francis, 1989, 1993). The aim of interpretation is to challenge different directions and options from particular stakeholder groups. Ideas from this field of endeavour have been applied to accounting in the work of scholars such as Hines (1997), McKernan (2007), Shapiro (1997), Parker and Roffey (1997), Parker (2007), and Willmott (2008). Their work shares a concern for the role of accounting in the public interest and questions other approaches that have as their mandate the expansion of the domain of accounting to provide narratives concerning our utilization of the empirical and natural world (Arnold & Sikka, 2001; Arrington & Francis, 1989, 1993; Arrington & Schweiker, 1992; Arrington & Puxty, 1991; Arrington & Watkins, 2002). This article is motivated by the ideals expounded by the famous Sydney based accounting theorist Ray Chambers who attempted to extend the craft of accounting using resources from the broader social science literature. I argue that interpretive accounting research (IAR) is one such area of potential research interest and has the potential develop the theoretical structures of the discipline. Moreover, IAR has the potential to narrow the gap between what accounting reports and what social accountants would prefer to have reported. More fundamentally, this strand of research has the potential to realign accounting with the wider social sciences. In exploring the role of accounting, this paper argues that IAR is a useful research strategy to develop our appreciation of accounting in a social context. It has the potential to deepen our appreciation of accounting and improve our theoretical structures. The sociologist Hugh Willmott had the following to say about IAR:

Perspectives on Charles Taylor's reconciled society: community, difference and nature

This article explores Charles Taylors Hegelian and Aristotelian ethic of reconciliation. It comments on the critical work provided by Joel Anderson, Jürgen Habermas, Chandras Kukathas, Morag Patrick, Philip Pettit and Mark Redhead. It is argued that these critical perspectives on Taylors work have not fully developed the spirit of liberalism which runs like a red thread through his ethic of reconciliation. For Taylor, reconciliation embraces others who are different from us and aims to create a virtuous culture. Taylors critics overlook the liberal implications of his ethic and also do not recognize his commitment to the plural diversity in modern societies. Taylors communitarianism (post-liberalism in his mind) aims to create trust, openness and democratic accountability. The article concludes that democratic practice must also engage with others who are different from us, fostering a fusion of horizons that creates reconciliation and understanding.

Analyzing the quality, meaning and accountability of organizational reporting and communication

Abstract This paper provides a critical introduction to the issue about Analyzing the quality, meaning and accountability of organizational reporting and communication. The present paper begins by addressing why such analyses are important and then introduces each of the papers that appear in the issue. The contribution involves identifying and reviewing how each paper contributes to the literature on issues of quality, meaning and accountability associated with organizational reporting and communication.

Accounting for carbon and reframing disclosure : A business model approach

Abstract This paper contributes to the research in accounting and the debate about the nature of carbon footprint reporting for society. This paper utilises numbers and narratives to explore changes in carbon footprint using UK national carbon emissions data for the period 1990–2009 and six years (2006–2011) of carbon emissions data for the FTSE 100 group of companies and a case study that focuses on the UK mixed grocery sector. Our argument is that existing approaches to framing carbon disclosure generate malleable, inconsistent and irreconcilable numbers and narratives. In this paper we argue for an alternative framing of carbon disclosure informed by a reporting entities business model. Specifically, we suggest, that a reporting entity disclose its carbon–material stakeholder relations. This alternative, we argue, would increase the visibility of carbon generating stakeholder relations and avoid some of the difficulties and arbitrariness associated with framing carbon disclosure around a reporting entity boundary where judgements have to be made about responsibility and operational control.

Corporate environmental reporting through the lens of semiotics

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to understand the motives behind corporate environmental reporting in Malaysia and Australia from an alternative perspective, i.e. through semiotics. Design/methodology/approach - Reviews are made on the annual reports of the top 50 public companies in both countries, and the uses of business languages in those reports are investigated. The research concentrates on the significations of environmental messages made through paradigmatic and syntagmatic tests. Findings - Corporate environmental disclosures made by the public companies in Malaysia and Australia signify similar form of motives. The tones, orientations, and patterns of environmental disclosures indicate that environmental information is a strategic mechanism used towards enhancing good corporate reputation. Research limitations/implications - Environmental reporting plays a significant role in promoting corporate “green” image in conjunction with the aims for better social integration. Practical implications - Semiotics offers a useful basis that enables a greater understanding of why companies prepare and disclose environmental information. Such an understanding holds the potential to provide ideas and guide policy-makers, and other stakeholders (and users) of corporate environmental information. Originality/value - This paper is the first to comparatively investigate the corporate motives and intention of environmental reporting practices via the application of semiotics on a two-country data, specifically Malaysia and Australia.

Interpretivism, postmodernism and nature: Ecological conversations:

This article uses the interpretive work of Dreyfus, Gadamer, Nussbaum and Taylor to explore the natural environment as a shared ecological and social commonality. I focus on the supposition that the natural world possesses intrinsic value and new political structures are needed. I explore how we might better engage with multiple cultures concerning matters at the heart of ecological politics. Political interpretivists offer processes of equal facilitation and maximization that work to include environmental values in democratic thought. Interpretivists differ from earth-based and neo-conservative environmentalists, who dominate modern debates. The differences involve understanding the role of practical reasoning and how humanity interacts with the natural world. Intriguingly, then, interpretivists concur with Deep Ecologists that nature possesses intrinsic value, but do so guided by an ideal of authenticity.