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Paper #24

Wednesday 5th August
11:00-12:30
Session 3 Room 2

It is no longer contentious to recognise conventional accounting as a subtle language through which values of control and order are manifest. We can observe this at the organisational and policy levels as well in its role as a vehicle for "soft imperialism" in the imposition of western accounting on "lesser developed countries/emerging nations". Indeed, despite the importance of accounting as a vehicle for the spread, imposition and acceptance of western capitalist values, we still see relatively little exploration in the literature of accounting's role on the global stage. One such stage is that relating to the battle for the meaning and soul of sustainability. Sustainability took a central position on the world policy stage following the Brundtland Report in 1987. The Rio "Earth Summit" in 1991 - the biggest international conference ever held - was organised by the United Nations to articulate sustainability and to set it into policy processes. Transnational business carefully and cleverly removed all matters relating to business from that conference on the argument that "sustainability was safe with business". This is clearly nonsense but certain key players and international business organisations have been remarkably successful at keeping control of the sustainability agenda as it affects business. Consequently, the United Nations has been exercised in trying to reclaim the soul of sustainability from transnational enterprises and their representatives. This paper attempts to rehearse this process and accounting's role within it. Central to the discussion is a series of engagements - including a commissioned research study - by the authors with, and on behalf of, the United Nations. The central argument is that accounting is pivotal to the capture/re-capture of the sustainability agenda.

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