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Accounting, Organizations and Society. Vol. 5, No. 1, p. 1.

FergamonPress Ltd, 1980. Printed in Great Britain.

EDITORIAL

The papers in this issue of Accounting, inquiry and debate. And whilst some appealed to
Organizations and Society were presented at a broader political concerns, to accountability for
conference organized by the Graduate School of instance, striving thereby to demonstrate how
Management of the University of California at Los accounting might help to create a new future,
Angeles in July, 1979. Focusing on the theme of others emphasised the need for accounting to
The Role of Accounting in Organizations and adapt to a future that is already emergent today.
Society, the conference brought together a group Overall it would be fair to say that the diversity
of accounting scholars from the U.S.A., Europe of perspectives served to mirror the conflicting and
and Australia to discuss aspects of the current heterogeneous nature of accounting in action.
state-of-the-art of accounting research and There too, as we all know only too well, there are
thought. As the title of the event implied, a multitude of different conceptions of both what
particular emphasis was placed on trying to is and what is to be. Given this similarity, perhaps
understand the roles which accounting had played, more could have been done to contrast the
is playing and might play in organizational and seemingly different perceptions of the accounting
social action. domain which were represented at the conference.
Not surprisingly, a theme of such scope resulted Perhaps, in retrospect, with such a variety of
in a diverse array of perspectives and orientations. perspectives represented, more explicit considera-
The historical was contrasted with the futuristic; tion should have been given to the different
the institutional with the abstract; the psycho- presumptions that were made about the nature of
logical with the sociological; the social with the organizational and social action and the roles
technical; and the critical with the accepting. which accounting was seen as playing. Were the
Despite such a diversity however, all of the papers various perspectives potentially overlapping and
tried to confront at least some aspects of what it reinforcing, one wonders, or were the different
might mean to study accounting as an organiza- presumptions and emphases reflective of very
tional and social phenomenon. different rationales for analysis and action? And if
To do this, some adopted a more appreciative the latter was the case; just what are the
perspective, seeking to illuminate the accounting implications for both the study and the guidance
context and those conditions which had of the accounting craft? Perhaps also, as C. West
stimulated the development of the craft. How had Churchman emphasised in his concluding remarks
accounting come to be as it is, they asked. What at the conference, more consideration could have
factors have influenced its development and been given to teasing out the models of human
resulted in its present organizational and social action and potential that were implicit rather than
significance? Just how do the processes of explicit in so many of the papers and debates. Was,
accounting change function in practice? And how one wonders, accounting being seen as a
is accounting inquiry itself conducted? Being constraining force, reflection of the desire to
willing to problematise the accounting craft, these order, regulate and control, or was accounting
authors sought to demonstrate the potential of being seen in a more facilitative and enabling
organizational and social inquiries into accounting manner?
as it has become and now is. That such questions can be raised points to the
Other papers adopted a more explicit applied richness of the issues discussed in the papers. And
orientation, being aware of what is but seeking that the questions were not answered, only serves
to influence what might be. Here also, however, to emphasise the need for further exploration and
change was studied from a number of very debate.
different perspectives. Some papers emphasised On this occasion the papers are published in the
the role of technological change; others stressed order in which they were presented at the
the primacy of the institutional domain, both conference rather than in the alphabetical order
broadly and narrowly conceived; and yet others which constitutes the normal practice of this
placed more emphasis on the enabling role of journal.
discourse and deliberation, and the conduct of Anthony G. Hopwood

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