Accounting and accountability relations: colonization, genocide and Canada’s first nationsDean Neu
2000 Accounting Auditing & Accountability Journal
doi: 10.1108/09513570010334126
The current study starts from the premise that accounting techniques and calculations have been, and continue to be, implicated in the colonization and genocide of Canada's first nations. Relying upon previous literature concerned with governmentality, colonialism and genocide, it is proposed that accounting techniques helped to translate (neo)-colonial policies into practice with (un)intended genocidal outcomes. Through an examination of historical examples, the analyses highlight how accounting techniques helped to translate policies of conquest, annihilation, containment and assimilation into practice, with the resultant outcomes of reproductive genocide, cultural genocide and ecocide.
Accounting as a tool for Aboriginal dispossession: then and nowKathy Gibson
2000 Accounting Auditing & Accountability Journal
doi: 10.1108/09513570010334784
While the physical dispossession of Aboriginal Australians since European settlement has been well documented, a more insidious role, which has been played stealthily and with little publicity, is that played by accounting practices. Through their contribution to the displacement of social values by economic imperatives, measured by yardsticks such as profitability and financial accountability, these practices have acted to continue the dispossession process. Accounting concepts are examined in the light of a hunter-gatherer social economy and the unsuitability of modern accounting to provide for a social accountability is highlighted. Examples show that the meaning of today's accounting concepts is in many instances directly opposed to the understanding of those concepts in traditional Aboriginal societies. More important, perhaps, are the effects of currently popular beliefs that dispossession and injustice are historical, and have been remedied by government and social initiatives. Contrary to this perception, it will be shown that in many cases attitudes remain that hold Aboriginal organisations to a higher level of accountability than other government-funded bodies. These accountability hurdles, that effectively restrict access to resources, are simply a less overt continuation of the processes of dispossession.
The issue of Australian indigenous world‐views and accountingSusan Greer; Chris Patel
2000 Accounting Auditing & Accountability Journal
doi: 10.1108/09513570010334793
Traditionally, mainstream cross-cultural accounting research has applied a societal norms and values measure to the examination of differences in culture. This approach is limited, however, because it effectively disfranchises the culture of minority groups such as indigenous peoples within nations. Our paper provides evidence of cultural differences between indigenous Australian values and the Western capitalist values implicit in the language of accounting and accountability. Utilising an alternative yin/yang framework developed for accounting by Hines, we argue that the core indigenous yin values of sharing, relatedness and kinship obligations inherent in indigenous conceptions of work and land, are incompatible with the yang values of quantification, objectivity, efficiency, productivity, reason and logic imposed by accounting and accountability systems. This conflict of values then brings into question the impact of accounting and accountability systems on the indigenous peoples of Australia whose beliefs, norms and values are organised differently. The need to address such a conflict is critical for all of the world's indigenous peoples. Perhaps even more so for the Australian indigenous peoples because of the insistence by governments, at both the state and federal levels, that the extreme social and economic disadvantages experienced by the Australian indigenous peoples can be dissipated by the imposition of strict financial accountability measures for all indigenous organisations and representative bodies. We argue that the demonstrated conflict of values is a significant reason for the inability of accounting and accountability systems to deliver such social and economic outcomes. The research findings of non-indigenous researchers are largely drawn on in this paper. The two authors of this paper are not indigenous people and therefore we are speaking "of" indigenous culture and not "speaking for" them.
Accounting for imperialism: a case of British‐imposed indigenous collaborationShanta Shareel Kreshna Davie
2000 Accounting Auditing & Accountability Journal
doi: 10.1108/09513570010334900
The involvement of accounting in imperial expansion in the South Pacific during the mid-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century is critically analysed. Through a study of archival data, it examines the way in which the practice of accounting became involved in the production of a calculative knowledge of imperialism. In particular, it explores: (a) the processes through which an indigenous Fijian élitist structure was transformed into a British instrument of domination and control; (b) the way in which accounting calculations and explanations were imposed upon the indigenous chiefs; and (c) the way in which accounting, once imposed, was used as an integral part of imperial policies and activities for Empire expansion. The study highlights that before annexation what was previously seen to be just a question of an "American debt" came to be seen as requiring formal imperial intervention. During formal imperial rule, however, British reaction to indigenous resistance to accounting-based administration was managed through a bargaining policy. This change enabled high chiefs to enjoy a "special immunity" through accounting's negotiable interpretations, interrelationships and explanations. Accounting as a financial and an administrative system of accountability thus became an integral part of a British-imposed collaborative system of imperialism.
Evaluating accountability: finding a place for the Treaty of Waitangi in the New Zealand public sectorKerry Jacobs
2000 Accounting Auditing & Accountability Journal
doi: 10.1108/09513570010334919
Examines the development of accountability for the Treaty of Waitangi in the New Zealand public sector. Considers how the nature of the accountability obligations arising from the Treaty have developed and how these differ from those that have developed generally in the New Zealand public sector. These obligations were made auditable through two accountability/review mechanisms: the reviews of service delivery to M \¯curr aori produced by Te Puni K \¯curr okiri and the "Delivering effective outputs for M \¯curr aori" review from the Office of the Auditor-General. It was found that these accountability mechanisms gave increased visibility to M \¯curr aori concerns and perspectives within government departments. However, while there was a clearly developed obligation of departments to answer for their practices in relation to M \¯curr aori, there was no satisfactory accountability mechanism for Parliament to account to M \¯curr aori.