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The purpose of this paper is to present an expanded introduction of Jasanoff’s (2003, 2007) work on “technologies of humility” to the accounting literature and to show how it can be useful in developing critical dialogic accountings for non-financial matters.

Drawing on Jasanoff’s (2003, 2007) distinction between “technologies of hubris” and “technologies of humility”, this study extends prior research on critical dialogic accounting and accountability (CDAA) that seeks to “take pluralism seriously” (Brown, 2009; Dillard and Vinnari, 2019). This study shows how Jasanoff’s work facilitates constructing critical, reflexive approaches to accounting for non-financial matters consistent with agonistics-based CDAA.

Jasanoff’s four proposed focal points for developing new analytical tools for accounting for non-financial matters and promoting participatory governance – framing, vulnerability, distribution and learning – are argued to be useful in conceptualising possible CDAA technologies. These aspects are all currently ignored or downplayed in conventional approaches to accounting for non-financial matters, limiting accounting’s ability to promote more socially just and ecologically sustainable societies.

The authors introduce Jasanoff’s work on technologies of humility to show how CDAA, informed by Jasanoff’s proposed focal points, can help to expose controversial issues that powerful interests prefer to obscure, to surface the normative foundations of technocratic analytic methods, to address the need for plural perspectives and social learning and to bring all these aspects “into the dynamics of democratic debate” (Jasanoff, 2003, p. 240). As such, they provide criteria for constructing accounting technology consistent with agonistics-based CDAA.

To present an analytical framework for conducting critical dialogic accounting and accountability-based participatory action research to further democratisation, social change and empowering marginalised groups, and to reflect on its application in a Bangladeshi nongovernmental organisation's microfinance program.

The framework, synthesising prior CDAA theorising and agonistic-inspired action research, is described, followed by a discussion of the methodological challenges when applying this during a ten-year, ongoing intervention seeking greater voice for poor, female borrowers.

Six methodological issues emerged: investigating contested issues rather than organisation-centric research; identifying and engaging divergent discourses; engaging marginalised groups, activists and/or dominant powerholders; addressing power and power relations; building alliances for change; and evaluating and disseminating results. The authors discuss these issues and how the participatory action research methods and analytical tools used evolved in response to emergent challenges, and key lessons learned in a study of microfinance and women's empowerment.

The paper addresses calls within and beyond accounting to develop critical, engaged and change-oriented scholarship adopting an agonistic research methodology. It uses a novel critical dialogic accounting and accountability-based participatory action research approach. The reflexive examination of its application engaging NGOs, social activists, and poor women to challenge dominant discourses and practices, and build alliances for change, explores issues encountered. The paper concludes with reflective questions to aid researchers interested in undertaking similar studies in other contentious, power-laden areas concerning marginalised groups.

The purpose of this polyphonic paper is to report on interdisciplinary discussions on the state-of-the-art and future of public sector accounting research (PSAR). The authors hope to enliven the debates of the past and future developments in terms of context, themes, theories, methods and impacts in the field of PSAR by the exchanges they include here.

This polyphonic paper adopts an interdisciplinary approach. It brings into conversation ideas, views and approaches of several scholars on the actual and future developments of PSAR in various contexts, and explores potential implications.

This paper has brought together scholars from a plurality of disciplines, research methods and geographical areas, showing at the same time several points of convergence on important future themes (such as accounting as a mean for public, accounting, hybridity and value pluralism) and enabling conditions (accounting capabilities, profession and digitalisation) for PSA scholarship and practice, and the richness of looking at them from a plurality of perspectives.

Exploring these past and future developments opens up the potential for interesting theoretical insights. A much greater theoretical and practical reconsideration of PSAR will be fostered by the exchanges included here.

In setting out a future research agenda, this paper fosters theoretical and methodological pluralism in the interdisciplinary research community interested in PSAR in various contexts. The discussion perspectives presented in this paper constitute not only a basis for further research in this relevant accounting area on the role, status and developments of PSAR but also creative potential for practitioners to be more reflective on their practices and also intended and united outcomes of such practices.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the extent to which organisations engage with stakeholders about social and environmental issues. The authors establish where the designers of these reports source the information reported.

This was an exploratory study that employed a qualitative research design. Interviews with 24 individuals from 15 organisations in New Zealand that are involved with the writing of sustainability reports were conducted. In addition documents were analysed from a number of organisations to allow for triangulation.

Findings indicate that engagement with stakeholders was important and one of the main purposes was to have a licence to stay in business. It was also found that managers do prioritise the saliency of issues. Generally, stakeholders do not get involved in the decision making pertaining to environmental issues in organisations.

The sample investigated in this study was relatively small so generalisation of the results would be difficult. However, these in depth interviews did provide insights that can be used in further study using large samples and in different countries.

This is the first time that the designers of annual reports were interviewed. They have knowledge of the extent of stakeholder engagement with firms.

Small Claims Court Television Shows offer spectators an opportunity to re-envision their relationship to legal and civic judgment. Through presenting racial and regional judges, these shows re-imagine legal judgment as a necessary and inclusive component of everyday citizenship. Reflecting Reality TV, Tabloid TV Talk Shows, and the History of African-American representation on television, shows like Judge Mathis and Judge Judy demonstrate the contradictions inherent in racial representations on television. By showing the ways in which television performance reflects the performative aspect of legal discourse already operating upon us, the judges use stupidity as a way to pedagogically energize a lower class, disenfranchised viewership into newly rehearsing their roles as active citizens.

The purpose of this paper is to synthesize work in the emerging field of how accounting and accountability can be reoriented to better promote pluralistic democracy which recognizes and addresses differentials in power, beliefs and desires of constituencies. An agenda for future research and engagement is outlined, drawing on this and insights from other papers in this special issue of the Accounting, Auditing and Accountability Journal (AAAJ) aimed at taking multiple perspectives seriously.

The paper reviews and synthesizes the central themes associated with accounting, accountants and accountability regimes in pluralistic societies, especially with respect to the research studies in this AAAJ special issue, and it identifies possibilities for future research and engagement.

Three central themes are identified: the challenges of achieving critical, pluralistic engagement in and through mainstream institutions; the possibilities of taking multiple perspectives seriously through decentred understandings of governance and democracy; and the value of an agonistic ethos of engagement in accounting. The articles in this issue contribute to these themes, albeit differently, and in combination with the extant social science literature reviewed here, open up pathways for future research and engagement.

This work seeks to encourage the development of pluralistic accounting and accountability systems drawing on conceptual and practice-based resources across disciplines and by considering the standpoints of diverse interested constituencies, including academics, policymakers, business leaders and social movements.

How accounting can reflect and enact pluralistic democracy, not least to involve civil society, and how problems related to power differentials and seemingly incompatible aims can be addressed has been largely neglected. This issue provides empirical, practical and theoretical material to advance further work in the area.

The purpose of this paper is to add to efforts to treat the relationship between accounting, democracy and emancipation more seriously, giving recognition to difference in this context. To open up space for emancipatory praxis vis-à-vis accounting, the authors articulate a delineation of accounting as a differentiated universal and emphasise the significance of an appreciation of accounting as contextually situated. The authors outline implications of a reading of new pragmatism for emancipatory praxis in relation to accounting that takes democracy and difference seriously.

Critical and analytical argument reflecting upon previous literature in the humanities and social sciences (e.g. Laclau and Mouffe, 2001) and in accounting (e.g. Gallhofer and Haslam, 2003; Bebbington et al., 2007; Brown, 2009, 2010; Blackburn et al., 2014; Brown and Dillard, 2013a, b; Dillard and Yuthas, 2013) to consider further accounting’s alignment to an emancipatory praxis taking democracy and difference seriously.

A vision and framing of emancipatory praxis vis-à-vis accounting is put forward as a contribution that the authors hope stimulates further discussion.

The authors extend and bolster previous literature seeking to align accounting and emancipation through further reflection upon new pragmatist perspectives on democracy and difference. In the articulations and emphases here, the authors make some particular contributions including notably the following. The accounting delineation, which includes appreciation of accounting as a differentiated universal, and a considered approach to appreciation of accounting as contextually situated help to open up further space for praxis vis-à-vis accounting. The authors offer a general outline of accounting’s positioning vis-à-vis a reading of a new pragmatist perspective on emancipatory praxis. The authors articulate the perspective in terms of key principles of design for emancipatory praxis vis-à-vis accounting: take seriously an accounting delineation freeing accounting from unnecessary constraints; engage with all accountings in accord with a principle of prioritisation; engage with accounting in a way appreciative of its properties, dimensions and contextual situatedness; engage more generally in a new pragmatist praxis. This adds support to and extends prior literature. The authors elaborate in this context how appreciation of a new pragmatist continuum thinking that helps to highlight and bring out emancipatory and repressive dimensions of accounting can properly inform interaction with existing as well as new envisaged accountings, including what the authors term here “official” accountings.

The purpose of this paper is to critically assess integrated reporting so as to “broaden out” and “open up” dialogue and debate about how accounting and reporting standards might assist or obstruct efforts to foster sustainable business practices.

The authors link current debates about integrated reporting to prior research on the contested politics of social and environmental reporting, and critiques of the dominance of business case framings. The authors introduce research from science and technology studies that seeks to broaden out and open up appraisal methods and engagement processes in ways that highlight divergent framings and politically contentious issues, in an effort to develop empowering designs for sustainability. The authors demonstrate the strong resonance between this work and calls for the development of dialogic/polylogic accountings that take pluralism seriously by addressing constituencies and perspectives currently marginalized in mainstream accounting. The authors draw and build on both literatures to critically reflect on the International Integrated Reporting Council's (IIRC, 2011, 2012a, b, 2013a, b) advocacy of a business case approach to integrated reporting as an innovation that can contribute to sustainability transitions.

The authors argue that integrated reporting, as conceived by the IIRC, provides a very limited and one-sided approach to assessing and reporting on sustainability issues. While the business case framing on which it rests might assist in extending the range of phenomena accounted for in organizational reports, it remains an ideologically closed approach that is more likely to reinforce rather than encourage critical reflection on “business as usual” practices. Recognizing that the meaning and design of integrated reporting are still far from stabilized, the authors also illustrate more enabling possibilities aimed at identifying and engaging diverse socio-political perspectives.

Science and technology studies research on the need to broaden out and open up appraisal methods, together with proposals for dialogic/polylogic accountings, facilitates a critical, nuanced discussion of the value of integrated reporting as a change initiative that might foster transitions to more sustainable business practices.

The authors link ideas and findings from science and technology studies with literature on dialogic/polylogic accountings to engage current debates around the merits of integrated reporting as a change initiative that can contribute to sustainability. This paper advances understanding of the role of accounting in sustainability transitions in three main ways: first, it takes discussion of accounting change beyond the organizational level, where much professional and academic literature is currently focussed, and extends existing critiques of business case approaches to social and environmental reporting; second, it emphasizes the political and power-laden nature of appraisal processes, dimensions that are under-scrutinized in existing accounting literature; and third, it introduces a novel framework that enables evaluation of individual disclosure initiatives such as integrated reporting without losing sight of the big picture of sustainability challenges.

The purpose of this paper is to review the current research program in agonistic dialogic accounting and to reflect on future possibilities for broadening out and opening up accounting and accountability systems, especially as they relate to social and environmental accounting (SEA).

The authors describe an ethic of accountability as a context for dialogue and debate intended to broaden out and open up new imaginings of accounting for democracy. The authors review the accounting literature addressing dialogic accounting and agonistics as the precursor of what has evolved into agonistic dialogic accounting. The authors discuss their work to date on agonistic pluralism and engagement, recognizing the necessity of linking the normative framework to an effective political program. The authors review prior studies applying science and technology studies that have addressed these issues.

The authors consider how the application of agonistic ideas might facilitate the development of multiple accountings that take pluralism seriously by addressing constituencies and perspectives often marginalized in both SEA and mainstream accounting. An ethic of accountability and science and technology studies are useful for stimulating dialogue and debate regarding democratic and civil society institutions as they relate to economic entities, especially corporations.

Agonistic dialogic accounting in conjunction with other disciplines such as science and technology studies can be used in formulating, implementing and evaluating policy for advancing a progressive social agenda.

A reflective view of the current work in agonistic dialogic accounting highlights considerations for further research regarding the possible interdisciplinary work particularly with science and technology studies in broadening out and opening up accounting and accountability systems as facilitators of progressive social agenda.

The purpose of this paper is first, to investigate empirically the plurality of understanding surrounding sustainability held by those working in the business sector, and second, to consider the likelihood of a dialogic accounting that would account for the plurality of perspectives identified.

The subjects of this study are those people actively working to incorporate sustainability within New Zealand business, both business people and their sustainability advisors. Participant’s subjective understanding is investigated using Q methodology, a method used widely by social science researchers to investigate typical views on a particular topic, from an analysis of the order in which participants individually sort a sample of stimuli. In this study, the stimuli were opinion statements.

Five typical understandings of sustainable development were identified, including understandings more usually attributed to business antagonists than business. Conflicts between environment and development are acknowledged by most participants. However, an agonistic debate that will create spaces, practices, and institutions through which marginalised understandings of sustainable development might be addressed and contested, is yet to be established and will not be easy.

The paper contributes to the few empirical investigations of the plurality of understandings of sustainability held by those people working to incorporate sustainability within business. It is further distinguished by the authors attempt to describe divergent beliefs and values, absent from their immediate business context, and absent from any academic priming. The paper also provides an illustrative example of the application of Q methodology, a method not commonly used in accounting research.