Green Accounting: Cosmetic Irrelevance or Radical Agenda for Change?

Abstract

Environmental accounting is enjoying an unprecedented resurgence to the point where, for the first time in its relatively short history, it looks like becoming an accepted part of the accounting firmament. However, there is a price for this recognition. That is, for many commentators—especially those associated with the accounting profession—environmental accounting is in the process of being reduced to something which will code easily into existing financial accounting and/or management accounting principles. If this were to happen then there is little of value which, in our view, could be said about the subject. We view environmental accounting as being a great deal larger in scope than this and, more especially, a great deal more important than a minor adjustment to the costs or the risk profile of a few companies. This distinction—between “conventional” and more “radical” approaches to environmental (and social) accounting is central to this paper in which we attempt to address the critics—most especially those from the, so called, critical school—of the environmental (and social) accounting project. We find the charges lodged by the critical school have crucial issues at their core which we, as accountants, ignore at our peril. However, we also maintain that the critical theorists have, themselves, failed either to recognise this distinction which we draw, or offer any realistic alternative for the practice of “new” accounting. Criticism is very well received if it is accurate and offers some useful way forward. We believe that environmental (and social) accounting does this but we are not sure that the critical theorists can legitimately make the same claim.