Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473

Social justice in a cold climate: Could social

accounting make a difference?
Amanda Ball a,b, , Will Seal b
a University of Nottingham Business School, UK
b Loughborough University Business School, UK

Abstract

Building on the argument that justice should be the transcendent principle in accounting, we argue
that social accounting invokes notions of community, shared social values, and fairness in the distri-
bution of social resources. These ideas are elaborated in relation to local government, which provides
a window on how communities make decisions about distributing their social resources and the
accounting processes which guide these decisions. Fieldwork in two large but contrasting English
local authorities suggests that the potential of social accounting is not reflected in the predominant
accounting systems in local government organisations, but in more subtle and successful forms of
enacted social accounting. Its utility relates to the achievement of short-term social goals where social
injustices persist and accountants, managers and politicians seek to accommodate financial pressures
to protect the most vulnerable members of the community. We identify local government accountants
as morally responsible for the further development of social accounting which envisions a future for
local government, and establishes links between social justice, environmentalism and localism.
2005 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Keywords: Social accounting; Public sector; Local government; Justice; Fairness

1. Introduction

Social accounting is broadly understood as involving the preparation, presentation and

reporting of information about social factors or conditions, with the social account being
juxtaposed or competing with economic factors and values (cf. Cooper, Taylor, Smith, &

Corresponding author at: Nottingham University Business School, Jubilee Campus, Nottingham NG8 1BB,

UK. Tel.: +44 115 9515151.

E-mail address: amanda.ball@Nottingham.ac.uk (A. Ball).

0155-9982/$ see front matter 2005 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

doi:10.1016/j.accfor.2005.08.001
456 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473

Catchpowle, 2005; Gray, 2001; Neu, Warsame, & Pedwell, 1998). Yet while recent work
in relation to a sustainability agenda has begun to discuss what accounting for ecological
sustainability might incorporate (see for example, Ball & Milne, 2005; Birkin, 1996, 2000;
Milne, 1996), there is a paucity of work which elaborates what might be at stake if accounting
is to tackle issues of social justice. There is a similar discrepancy in the practice of social
accounting, where whilst an increasing numbers of companies claim they are producing
sustainability reports, a critical examination demonstrates that they have largely side-
stepped the issue of accounting for, and reporting on, their social obligations or role in
a more socially sustainable future (see Gray, 2001, 2002; Milne & Ball, 2005; Owen &
Swift, 2001; UNEP/SustainAbility, 1994, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2002, 2004). Such emphasis
on ecological sustainability in the social accounting literature seems curious given that,
for many, the argument for sustainability is itself presaged on the more transcendental
principle of justice (Pallot, 1991). Indeed, as Bebbington has argued (2001, p. 136), the
moral imperative of sustainable development (SD) is focussed on the achievement of social
justice for the very poorest occupants of the planet.
The statutory and political roles of many public service organisations, and local gov-
ernment authorities in particular, mean that (unlike companies in a capitalist society) it is
impossible for these organisations to avoid engaging with issues of social justice. Although
we argue that their role has been diminished in recent years, local authorities in England,
for example, have been central to the delivery of education and social services, and in
responding to wider social crises such as race riots.
The purpose of this paper is to explore whether there is a possibility of social account-
ing in relation to local government, and what its impact might be. What we mean here is
an accounting which, beyond concerns with an environmental agenda, helps us in under-
standing what is at stake in accounting for social justice. We argue that understanding
existing and possible future accounting processes in public service organisations might
be key to understanding what social accounting means, and whether it could make a
difference.
Given this central concern with the social, the paper builds upon an extant literature
on social justice, or fairness, in accounting (Gaa, 1986; Lehman, 1995, in press; Pallot,
1991; Williams, 1987; and cf. Mouck, 1995; Shearer, 2002). In calling for a return to
ethical approaches in accounting research, this body of work has explored how theories of
justice translate in an accounting context (Lehman, 1995, in press; Pallot, 1991; Williams,
1987). Pallot (1991) in particular sought to stimulate discussion by proposing fairness
(i.e. justice) as the transcendent principle in accounting (Pallot, p. 202). We see the
aims of this work as consistent with elaborating the aspirations of a social accounting
agenda (see for example Bebbington, 1997; Gray, 2002; and for a critique see Cooper et al.,
2005).
The paper draws on some fieldwork on budgeting carried out in two local government
authorities (see Ball, 2005; Seal, 2003; Seal & Ball, 2003, 2005). These organisations pro-
vide a window on how communities make decisions about distributing their social resources.
In order to draw out what is at stake in the distribution of social resources, we focused on
contrasting organisations: Southshire (an affluent county council in the South of England)
and Eastmet (a metropolitan authority in the North of England). The fieldwork in these
authorities was carried out over an 18-month period (ending January 2004), focussing on
 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473 457

budgeting in personal social services for children, families and other individuals with a
range of personal, practical and emotional problems.
The study was part of a wider project that researched how New Labour modernising
policies have affected UK local government budgeting. We argue that budgeting in local
government is an inherently political process (Wildavsky, 1986), characterised by a certain
logic of democracy, which means that the process has an openness which contrasts with
the unobservable (Neu et al., 1998, p. 268) nature of corporate activities and accounting
processes. As the central accounting process in local government, budgeting is an obvi-
ous starting point for understanding the relationship between accounting and the social
dimensions of local government.
Apart from the routine observations of physical phenomena made during frequent visits
to the case authorities, the research drew on two main sources of data. First, there is a
wealth of documents produced by both local and central government, which, as public
sector bodies, they have published on the web. The second and main source of data came
from anonymized semi-structured interviews and observations of budgetary committees
which provided insights into the less planned, less consensual and less reverential views of
real organizational actors. The fieldwork period extended beyond the annual budgetary cycle
and involved at least two sets of interviews with the main players, with appropriate time
lapses. The main interviews were with local authority senior offices and council members
(politicians) in the two local authorities; politicians and officials in central government
departments who have an interest in local authority budgeting; and managers who are
responsible for managing services at the operational level.
In most cases, interviews were carried out by two researchers lasting about one hour per
session. This method ensured that as accurate a record as possible was kept of the interview,
and helped maintain a balance in the questioning. The aim of the case study approach was
to give both an in depth view of the impact of any budget changes and take a longitudinal
perspective.
The paper contributes the idea of a new type of social accounting which we argue
is a matter of enacted accommodation between financial discipline and social pressures.
Recognising the inherent fragility of the modernising project (Mouritsen, Larsen, & Hansen,
2002), we show how social accounting can be seen as less a system and more a local
accomplishment. The opportunity for accomplishment stems from the service delivery
potential of budgetary controls combined with an implicit acceptance by key actors of their
inherent public service ethos (Pollitt, 1993). These findings suggest that social accounting
may have most impact where it is linked to specific social problems (cf. Cooper et al., 2005),
and where it is produced outside of the mainstream performance and reporting system.
The paper is structured as follows. The next section of the paper reviews the long running
problems and attempted reform agendas in English local government. Drawing on a review
of fairness (social justice) and accounting literature, the third section sets out what social
accounting for local government might incorporate. The fourth section of the paper draws
on fieldwork at Southshire and Eastmet. In this section we set out our findings in relation
to the budgeting process and the phenomenon of enacted social accounting, whereby the
justice dimensions of accounting are recognised and budgeting is used an enabler to achieve
social goals. A final section draws conclusions in relation to our understanding of social
accounting and its potential.
458 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473

2. English local government: problems and reforms agendas

Taking a pessimistic view, it is possible to see English local government as operating in a

society dominated by market ideology, obsessed with economic growth, private enterprise
and managerialist reform of local public services (Seal & Ball, 2005). Local government is
the provider of residual social services for which there is no possibility of insurance, often
for the most vulnerable, and often in the context of providing services which no one else is
interested in providing (cf. Stoker, 2001, p. 4). Even on this pessimistic view, though, the key
point to recognise is that these organisations are fundamentally not constrained by having to
make decisions based on individualistic business interests. Rather, they exist primarily for
the purpose of the social distribution of societal resources. Given the statutory and political
roles of local government in personal social services and wider social crises (race riots in
Eastmet, for example), it seems reasonable to say that it is impossible for these organisations
to avoid engagement with the social. This engagement does not mean, however, that local
authorities have made conceptual links between their role in social issues and services
and the socially unsustainable trends attendant upon the Western economic growth model.
Southshire, located in the south of England and described by one senior manager as the
California of Britain . . . a very comfortable place to be, seemed to illustrate how aspects
of economic change in the industrialized world has, in many cases, widened the gap between
the richest and the poorest groups, compounding the disadvantages suffered by people on
low incomes and leading to growth of a super-class . . . of hyper-affluent people . . .
(Christie & Warburton, 2001,1 pp. viiiix).
Although there may still be a continuing influence of the New Public Management (Hood,
1995), the New Labour reforms do show some signs of Third Way thinking (Giddens, 1998,
2001). Dismissed by both right and left wings (Callinicos, 2001) of the political spectrum
and without an explicit programme for social justice, the Third Way does, nevertheless,
espouse policies of social inclusion and democratic renewal that seem consistent with a
social accounting agenda. But however re-assuring the communitarian and socially inclu-
sive rhetoric may sound, we agree with those critics of the Third Way (especially Callinicos,
2001) who see the concept as an ideological shell for neo-liberal thinking which underes-
timates the crucial importance of the pressure exerted by globalising capital on local and
national labour markets. Indeed, New Labours approach to local governance has arguably
ignored the detachment of the metropolitan elites and super rich (in counties like Southshire)
and, rather, placed the much of the burden of achieving social inclusiveness among lower
income groups, emphasising in particular educational targets for local schools (in Eastmet).
Stoker (2001, p. 5) portrays the institution of local government as failing to be embedded
at the local level; as combining technical capacity with rigid political organisation, insulated
from the local (and national) environment; as slow to learn and respond to the demands
of community governance; and as struggling to come to terms with different demands
and pressures in the context of welfare. Protection of existing programmes and resource
allocation may also be tied to saving jobs or avoiding the costs of redundancy. The term

1 Christie and Warburton (2001, p. 6) write on behalf of the Real World Coalition which is a coalition of

UK not-for-profit organisations campaigning on what they recognise as causally-linked but distinctive policy
constituencies of sustainability. See http://www.realworld.org.uk/index.html: accessed 27/10/03.
 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473 459

shroud-waving was used by the Director of Finance at Eastmet to describe how budgetees
threaten to invoke the inevitable political conflict in the face of potential loss of socially
valuable services.
It was certainly evident from our fieldwork that central rather than local government dom-
inates the political space within which we might conceive of there being social accounting.
For example, a dominant concern of the National Health Service is with the purported role
of local government in contributing to bed-blocking through failing to provide residential
care places for old/elderly people discharged from hospital care. Another problem which
was exacerbated in Eastmet and Southshire by central government interference was the
sheer complexity of local government finance. In relation to bed-blocking, central govern-
ment has provided Cash for Change, but as the Head of Finance (Adults and Community
Care) at Southshire explained,
We can only agree to take them [elderly residents] on if theres funding. It dents bed-
blocking numbers . . . but then the beds are refilled. Cash for change [grant from
government] is supposed to encourage a change in systems of care pathways, putting
in support for people in their own homes . . .. We have to say that if you want the
numbers down now well have to use the money to get people into care now. The
money is only guaranteed for one year. I have to tell people they cant commit money.
We may have to take a risk or well get decimated . . .
As Stoker (2001) notes, a number of factors have combined to undermine the traditional
political model of local government. Alongside changes in the fiscal framework are social
changes in terms of peoples expectations of government . . .. The revolution confronting
local government is not just a result of the mad spinning of change agents. It has a certain
structural substance (Stoker, 2001, p. 5). More generally, Beck (2001) suggests that we
live compartmentalised lives and that welfare is connected in peoples minds not with blows
of fate but with personal failure. Or as Lessing (1998) notes, we seem to have forgotten that
illness (fate) could bring down whole families. The corollary is that the first order questions
of (say) what the communitys needs are, and in what order these needs might be prioritised,
look to be very difficult to engage. As Lessing (1998) summarises, we live in a grudging,
cold, cautious time. Compounding this problem is the nature of many welfare services,
which are by their nature divisible (see Rose, 1973, p. 486).
In the current politico-economic climate of economic rationalism, the danger is that
the community is ideologically rewarded for acting as individual utility-maximisers, and
local politics is reduced to issues of the particular costs and benefits passed to individuals
(cf. Downs, 1960). Indeed, at Southshire, the indications were that Members and Officers
understand local politics in terms of managing (individualised) expectations. Examples of
views expressed included:
Most people are becoming more demanding of a whole set of things. Its like Tesco2
down the road. Because of email, and the whole e thing is driving a set of aspirations.
Some of it is coming from over the pond and going down the Courts route . . . if
you dont get your kids into the right school. Swimming pools . . . people want an

2 Tesco is a very successful supermarket chain which is becoming increasingly multi-national.

460 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473

experience, not the old veruca one. Expectations . . . meeting customers, the public,
expectations . . . We have one million customers (and there are customers who come
in to the County) so the relationship between their expectations and what their needs
are . . . there has to be some assessment of that and balancing . . . we cant do it all. We
need to know what it is to be a good provider . . . Brand is hugely important. People are
turned off by party politics . . . It just isnt interesting. (Southshire Executive Council
Member, Corporate Planning)
Given that these views were put to us by an elected representative rather than an appointed
official, it is striking to see how far the managerialist mindset had penetrated into the heart
of what should have been an essentially political organization.3
In conclusion to this section on the problems and reform agendas of English local
government, we contend that a range of questions is important: about what demands and
expectations people have of local government; about how strong/weak articulate/inarticulate
these demands are; about the extent to which these demands are a directive force; and about
the extent to which local politicians and officers actually respond to these demands. We
believe that these kinds of questions are important in moving the new social accounting
literature beyond mere aspirations and towards possible processes for change (cf. Gray,
2002).

3. Is social accounting a possible solution?

Thinking about social accounting processes, Gray (2001, p. 12) suggests that the stake-
holder dialogue process should lead to an accounting that includes information concerning
the preferences and views of stakeholders. Also of note in this context, the current wave
of modernising reforms asks local authorities to actively canvass the views of stakehold-
ers. Yet at Eastmet, in a recent survey, the majority of returned questionnaires about social
services were from social workers!
Social accounting is often theorised in terms of a liberal model of governance, leading to
greater transparency, dialogue and ultimately change (Gray, 1992, 2002; and see Lehman,
1999, in press, for a discussion). Boyce (2000, p. 31), for example, relies on such an
understanding of the politics of a change process, suggesting the potential in the public
sector of:
. . . an emancipatory form of . . . social accounting. Such accounting would involve
a broad image of the interactions between an organisation and the world around it.
It would involve accounting . . . to a broad range of interested parties . . . accounting
might also be usefully concerned with . . . facilitating transparent democratic discourse
and debate . . .
The situation with respect to social pressures and expectations for welfare contrasts with
the environmental dimension and pressures of un-sustainability. Ball (2005) indicates that
environmental accounting in English local government provides a means of influencing

3 For further discussion of managerialism in local government see Seal and Ball (2005).
 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473 461

existing pressures for change, including legislative pressures relating to a national and local
agenda for sustainable development, but also changing organisational perspectives about
the functional utility of services in the context of the environmental agenda. In other words,
there are empirical realities (climate change; urban sprawl; road congestion that threatens to
choke off economic well-being; a pile up of municipal solid waste) which local authorities
are beginning to conceive of in terms of a crisis of un-sustainability (see Ball, 2005).
In contrast, what pressures are there to account for issues of social justice? Our review of
problems and reform agendas in local government has pointed to a situation where central
government dominates the political space within which social accounting might develop.
A parsimonious understanding of welfare dominates and welfare service providers find
themselves operating in a cold climate. This lack of pressure for social accounting may
explain both why there is such a significant gap in the social accounting discourse in relation
to justice; and at the same time the need to elaborate what might be achievable in practice.
In Pallots (1991) discussion of alternative conceptions of fairness, the current wave of
interest in corporate social responsibility accounting is explained in terms of an individu-
alist model of society. In corporate social reporting, as Pallot explains it, The underlying
assumption of the reporting entity as a sort of individual with rights to privacy and pri-
vate property is pervasive . . . (Pallot, 1991, p. 203).4 The communitarian argument is
that an individualist perspective simply cannot accommodate our propensity to participate
in public life; nor can it accommodate the legitimate moral claims of the public interest.
Fundamentally, communitarianism is an ontological critique of a certain type of liberalism.5
Pallots notion of an organic model implies acknowledging both individualist and com-
munitarian values. It provides for the possibility of extending the existing accounting model
for local government with new accounting concepts grounded in communitarian values. As
Pallot explains, a driving force in public sector accounting has been accountability as the
quid pro quo for greater power or control over resources (p. 202). This arrangement is
essentially rooted in an individualistic paradigm for accountability, with its implicit empha-
sis on contracts. In arguing for social accounting, however, there may be the possibility of
shifting practice in the sense that other, social values are invoked and reinforced.
Accounting and the accounting profession can both reflect and influence society, and
ultimately effect societal change when change is required (Hopwood, 1984; Lehman, 1995,
p. 395; Pallot, 1991, p. 204). Could accountants as a profession achieve a better accounting
in which these different perspectives are better balanced? The issue in this paper is whether
public sector accountants and accounting policy makers might be able to draw on existing
ethical reserves and legitimate an alternative accounting which incorporates fairness.
Pallot (1991) advocates giving communitarian values more visibility by developing new
accounting concepts. She discusses, for example, the notion of community assets (as
advocated by the New Zealand Society of Accountants, for example, in relation to govern-
ment managed facilities) as distinct from state assets (the private property of government

4 In a related argument (but from a Marxist perspective) Cooper et al. (2005, p. 3) warn against a pro-business

social accounting that keeps business needs at the forefront whilst attempting to reform market mechanisms through
the introduction of ethical and redistributive principles.
5 We are grateful to one of the referees for this insight. For a discussion of this point see, for example, Lehman

(in press).
462 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473

entities), which is argued to present a number of benefits, including the notion that peo-
ple have a common heritage (ranging from telecommunications networks to forests and
water supplies, 1991, p. 205), and that society as a whole should protect this heritage and
its continuance in the future. Accounting for community assets in this context is a foil
to rampant privatisation which increasingly extends to what were previously considered
public goods such as knowledge and clean air. . .. (1991, p. 205; and cf. Shaoul, 2005).
As Pallot points out (1991, p. 205) a notion of common property also helps to elaborate
intergenerational issues at stake in relation to the present generations rapid depletion of
finite and integrally valuable natural capital and environmental services. More generally, in
a public sector accounting framework, it would be possible to treat community assets such
that society and the owner are one and the same thing. Financial performance and social
objectives therefore merge so that objectives are solely social objectives (1991, p. 206).
To summarise, this brief review of the literature suggests a need to re-assert a public
sector ethos, which enables the enactment of communitarian rather than individualistic
values. Accordingly, social accounting would invoke a community or societal perspective;
shared social values; fairness in distribution of societal resources; or a vision of what a just
and socially sustainable community might be. The remainder of this paper is concerned with
understanding whether and how such social accounting might be developed in practice
and its utility.

4. Enacting social accounting: budgeting as the genesis of social accounting

How, then, is social accounting currently enacted at Eastmet and Southshire? What is
visible, and what values are articulated? In this section we aim to address these questions
by examining what is achieved under the budgeting system in the two organisations.
Although the dominant view of conventional accounting is that it is a process of rep-
resenting an objective financial and economic reality (Boyce, 2000, p. 29), budgeting in
local government has long been acknowledged as a political process (Wildavsky, 1986).
For example, whilst the study was conducted in the context of an overall expansion of
local government funding, the distribution of increases reflected a political decision to re-
distribute resources away from southern shire counties like Southshire towards northern and
midlands metropolitan authorities like Eastmet. At Southshire, the consequence has been a
steep Council tax rise, and Southshire Members (particularly the Council Leader) continue
to lobby Government to take account of perceived difficulties in providing quality services
in a high cost area. As one executive member of Southshire council put it, [Southshire] is a
terribly affluent place, but there are pockets of deprivation, which makes it worse if youre
in that cycle. There is a spiral of decline . . .. Or as the Deputy Director of Education put
it, [Southshire], the perennial image of golf courses . . . 25% of children in [Southshire]
are privately educated . . . children are mostly able . . . but our schools are a bit more like
everyone elses than you would probably think.
In contrast to the affluence of Southshire, Eastmet in the north of England has a
large population originating in the Indian sub-continent and faces the challenges of de-
industrialisation, high unemployment, and general economic decline. As the Director of
Finance at Eastmet put it, at [Eastmet] there is pre- and post-riots. There are community
 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473 463

cohesion teams crashing around. There havent been shed loads of money, though. Although
it has generally been Labour controlled, Eastmet council has had more recent periods of
Conservative control, and most recently had a hung council. Eastmet has a stronger sense
of locality than Southshire with a lively political culture. Interests, perhaps most notably
departmental interests, are mobilised to defend locally provided services when the budget
is made. With a vibrant local media (Seal & Ball, 2005), the Director of Finance at Eastmet
described budget-setting as subject to intense public, political and media scrutiny, and
decision-making in a goldfish bowl.
When it is afforded the centrality of the firm/society nexus envisaged in the social
accounting literature (see Gray, 2001, 2002), we suggest that the budgeting process provides
the genesis of a social accounting process in local government. Embodied in the budgeting
process are a certain public accountability, a potential openness and transparency in public
debate about what is planned that are so far only aspirations in the corporate social account-
ing literature. We argue that the budgeting process is potentially a social accounting process
as it encapsulates distributional issues that are at the core of the social accounting agenda. To
reiterate, Pallot (1991) indicated that it might be possible to extend the existing accounting
model (budgeting, here) with new accounting concepts grounded in communitarian values.
The questions here become: can the budgeting system operationalise any of the potential
of social accounting? Does it reflect shared social values and a concern with fairness in
distribution of community social resources? Does the accounting system enable a vision of
what a just and socially sustainable community might be?

4.1. Incrementalism and a tyranny of small decisions

Budgeting as we have so far portrayed it reflects struggles for fairness in the distribution
of community social resources. Yet our study points to an accounting system which is
dominated by the tyranny of small decisions and short-term financial crisis, which render
people involved apparently incapable of perceiving the long-term cumulative effects of the
decisions being made. The incremental approach that still drives budgeting at Southshire
and Eastmet makes long-term planning or holistic thinking about service provision difficult
(cf. Rose, 1973, p. 480). The problem with incrementalism is that the consideration of
medium-term objectives or second-order consequences is explicitly rejected. At Eastmet,
for example, the Advisor to the Chief Executive on Social Services described the budget for
social services as being the area of crisis in [Eastmets] budget. This crisis at Eastmet
was manifest in a 2.3m overspend by Childrens services, driven by a steep rise in the
number of looked after children, dubbed toxic babies (born to young drug or alcohol
using mothers) by the local paper. This interviewee explained the paradox that, in spite
of pressures to use expensive agency foster-carers (a problem compounded by the risk
that Eastmets own foster-carers then leave to meet agency demand), preventative work
. . . its the one area we dont have to do. As a consequence of the non-statutory status
of preventative work, this interviewee suggested that Eastmet had only recently begun to
develop the partnerships with other agencies needed to attract specific grant funding for
this work. He continued, however, that, if all else fails, we stop doing this and fight the
consequences. But there could be a huge impact its knowing the impact of preventative
work.
464 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473

Perhaps, in the context of this culture of incrementalism, we should not be surprised

at how remote social accounting developments around community and fairness in distri-
bution of community resources are from the main accounting and performance systems in
authorities like Southshire and Eastmet. At Eastmet, it seemed that a focus on controlling
short-term budgetary pressure militated against debate about the potential social costs of a
way of life that results, for example, in toxic babies, and whether these costs are too high,
and what might be done about it.

4.2. Enacted social accounting: its location in a critical accounting agenda

Although we did not find the sort of single order aspired to by Labour modernizers
(DETR, 1998), following the suggestions of John Law, we have traced the plural and
incomplete processes of social ordering (1994, p. 2). As Law points out, after a period of
triumphal liberal economics, there is a political story to tell, to do with ideals, values and
their limits a story that forms an essential part of any account of social ordering (1994, p.
3). Given that any social order is inherently fragile, we suggest that what is accomplished
under the predominant model suggests that at best we might look to a gradual trend in a
single direction (spending more on looked after children for example), perhaps gradually
enhancing services, but by no means providing assurance of particular outcomes.
In contrast to rather pessimistic verdicts emanating from the social accounting literature,
our fieldwork found evidence of a more subtle, but successful, form of social accounting.
In the present study, a way forward with developing the arguably well-intentioned, but
otherwise vague aspirations of social accounting (cf. Gray, 2002), is to look not at the
(budgetary) system as a whole, but to how accounting is currently enacted within that system.
What we argue for here is the idea of looking at how some episodes (social arrangements
which have cohered in particular situations) in the present study may indicate the possibility
of change (tapping into any existing political struggles/forces or building on ethical reserves
already achieved)even when there seems to be no possibility of change.
Our argument and approach here is informed by the work of Mouritsen et al. (2002). As
Mouritsen et al. explain, there is:
. . . a different understanding of critical accounting than those analyses informed
by philosophy of science on the ontology, epistemology and methodology aspects of
accounting research, which have suggested that research is to be problematized against
philosophical agendas. In contrast, we suggest that research can be characterized
by its implications for practice for its partisanship, for its normativity and for its
engagement. This is to accept Cooper and Sherers (1984) agenda . . .. (2002, p. 500)
Broadly, we wish to show social accounting can be seen as less a system (which we
argue is the conventional view of social accounting) and more a local accomplishment,
whereby:
. . . technology is not outside the social which therefore cannot be mere window-
dressing, as the institutional account would have it but indeed part of it in a socio-
technical accomplishment (Latour, 1991) . . .. The relations here constitute what the
world is nothing more, and nothing less. All is surface nothing is allowed to be
 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473 465

so deep that it cannot be reached. Nothing works behind the back (Latour, 1993). It is
only practical performance that will provide us with insights into the conditions for
the effects of accounting. (Mouritsen et al., 2002, p. 506)
There is a concern in this analytical approach with episodes in organisational life: . . .
episodic situations produce the conditions for and effects of accounting. It is impossible
in principle to define the list of properties that would be typical of life in society although
in practice it is possible to do so (Latour, 1986, p. 273) . . .. (Mouritsen et al., 2002,
p. 507). Mouritsen et al. reject the alternative of calls such as those of Gray (2002) for
greater attention to meta-narratives and theories (they have aesthetic value but not a lot
more . . ..), arguing:
. . . analysis helps us define the basis of . . . power and then show how fragile it is. The
point is that it takes a lot of effort to maintain the status quo, and therefore anything
that looks like an equilibrium of some sort is probably not analysed carefully enough.
If there is effort involved in maintaining the status quo, there is always the possibility
for change. This is the critical message, and the prescription is close to: make sure
that all the elements that go into producing a system a recurrent set of practices
are accorded agency whether human or non-human. (2002, p. 507)

4.3. Enacted social accounting: episodes in social service budgeting

Our findings at Southshire and Eastmet demonstrate that key actors, sometimes accoun-
tants, sometimes managers and sometimes council members enacted a form of social
accounting which relied on using budgeting as an enabler for the achievement of social
goals. This model requires discretion rather than visibility; action rather than publicity;
compromise rather than the invocation of competing interests. This form of social account-
ing can be illustrated by drawing on three major episodes in the study:

4.3.1. Policy towards travellers in Southshire

In this first episode we note how policy towards travellers in Southshire illustrates an
apparent paradox for accountability, given that the vulnerable get a worse deal if helping
them is made visible. The following quotation is from the head of service for traveller
education and support service at Southshire:
Theyre [traveller children] probably the most vulnerable group . . . under performing
nationally . . . the last Ofsted6 report was in 1996 . . . at Key Stage 1 & 2 the attendance
is fairly ok. It drops to 15% at Key Stage 3 and 5% at Key Stage 4 . . . were talking
about at least 10,000 children not in school. If it was any other ethnic group it would
be banner headlines. Its political dynamite. They [Council Members] do it covertly..
by ensuring funding is there . . .. people are afraid of the most mobile . . .. I get calls
about what are these animals doing in schools? Whos going to ensure that these
youngsters get a fair deal? Its the challenging behaviour that schools find difficult.
Were advocates for them.

6 Ofsted is a central government schools inspectorate body.

466 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473

Drawing on this episode, we argue that people in the organisation view others failure
to recognise the rights of traveller children to equal treatment in the education system as
intolerant and intolerable. Social accounting is enacted by allocating funding to ensure a fair
distribution of resourcesbut this is covert. Arguably, a concern in the social accounting
literature is that values be brought to the foreground in any social account. Gray (2001; and
cf. Boyce, 2000, p. 53) believes that to be any good, social accounting must be hurting.
A social accounting which was hurting might draw on notions of justice (Pallot, 1991) to
expose unjust situation its monstrosity and the prescription of its correction. Our findings
at Southshire, however, suggest a social accounting which avoids hurting or demonstrating
the injustice of this situation. This is a social accounting which apparently achieves a fair
situation vis-`a-vis these childrens education by avoiding the invocation of interests and
conflict.

4.3.2. The toxic baby problem at Eastmet

As we have noted, from a budgeting point of view, the problem service area for inter-
viewees at Eastmet was in social services, especially childrens services. The problems,
some proposed solutions and the interplay between politics and accounting systems were
set out by the Financial Information Services Manager responsible for social care as
follows:

From a Social Service department overview, theres a potential 1m overspend we

could absorb any level of council tax increase you care to name . . .. Thats clear
. . . if we dont get the number of children looked after down . . .. A [consultancy]
report will say we need to fund a prevention service that is the plan. Council may
choose no to go with that I cant see how they cant, with the financial implications
if they dont do it. The social service 3-year plan is demanding about 5m over
the next two years, its fair, but unlikely. Now theyre trying to link it into the . . .
[performance improvement system] . . . but theres an issue about how much resources
are available. Its less easy for a [poor performing] department to say they need . . .
resources.

The manager explained the unpredictability of budgeting without knowing what the
demand might be (the steep rise in toxic babies has not been fully explained). Indeed, the
emotional and ethical issues of trying to exert financial discipline were put very starkly:

It would be sitting on a child protection teams. . . . Id be unhappy and I cant see it

happening. For any other service (like a recreation centre) wed close it down. The
finance director would go in with chains and lock the door. If there are 800 children
in the system, thats 800 serious decisions.

The inherent but under-played drama of the budget discussions was evident, as he
remarked drolly, Given that weve got a 4m overspend, things are pretty calm in here.
What is accommodated, it seems, is the allocation of resources to care for toxic babies in
spite of a systemic problem (no resources to invest in a preventative service) which contin-
ually drives up costs. This enacted accommodation goes some way towards demonstrating
that an ad hoc form of justice (if not a fully developed concept of justice) is at play here.
 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473 467

4.3.3. Childrens services in Southshire

As in Eastmet, Southshire experienced budgetary overspends in its social services. The
head of childrens services explained the perceived problem of a small number of looked-
after children driving the budget. Problems were identified in terms of growth in this
particular group, and the uncontrollable cost of placements:

Theres an element where youre reacting. This year the pressure has been fees.
Teachers pay and conditions . . . one school put its fees up by 90% the childrens
parents have a right of appeal if you un-lock placements. Once a statement says school
x . . .. You cant say its inappropriate on the basis of cost. Also, we havent got enough
in-home providers foster carers. We want to start moving towards sustainability
enough resource to meet children needs . . .. At the moment we are spending . . . 24%
of the budget on less than 1000 children . . .. Agency placements . . .. Because of
the trend on fee increases . . . If your resource level is constrained to RPI increases,
youre . . .. Fees are going like that!! [draws a quick graph] Its the tail wagging the
dog you cant cut that provision if a court order says they have to has a therapeutic
environment. But if you cut your [own] staffing, your cutting the bulwark that stops
them going into care in the first place. Were on the edge . . ..

Short-term problems were compounded by a long-term problem in Southshirethe

difficulty in recruiting qualified social workers and foster carers to build capacity. As the
Head of Childrens Services at Southshire explained:

Capacity building Social workers at the front door, to do the assessment in the
timescales (we get assessed on timescale not quality) . . . we cant recruit social
workers its acute here. . . were whipping children out of families but we havent
got capacity to check if someone else in the family could take them . . .. We lack the
people . . . so were fostering . . .. And we havent got the foster carers; so were using
agency placements . . .. So we need people, with the right skills mix.

The Head of Childrens Services was more critical of governmental attitudes than bitter
about a lack of funding, however:

I dont believe there isnt enough money in the system. But there are drivers pushing
you in certain directions cultural and it takes a lot of professional discipline to
break that down. . . . youre never going to get wider knowledge or ownership of
your budget. One child of 7 . . . no parents . . . a placement cost of 250k per year
. . .. Were institutionalising him . . .. What are we getting? Whats the package? The
social worker went and asked and thought it would be less damaging to keep him
where he is . . .. The culture is to respond to the individual need of the child . . . but
there are very precise legislation drivers The government and the politicians are so
dishonest . . . all this bollocks about choice . . ..

As in episodes (i) and (ii) above, in this episode we note that the moral dimensions of
accounting are recognised (Williams, 1987). In this episode moral concerns do not translate
to a desire to question the fairness of the system, however, or to think about its re-design.
468 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473

Rather, these concerns translate to the creative use of a fundamentally constraining system
to enable the short-term social goal of ensuring enough money is made available for children
to be looked after.

4.4. Some reections and a tentative prescription

When we examine these episodes we can see that there are two main sets of agents who
enact social accounting. One set comprises finance professionals who have been attached
to social services and who have absorbed the concerns and values of the social service pro-
fessionals and the vulnerable people they work with. A possible explanation of the origin
of their values (bearing in mind that it is very difficult to know what inward motivations
people have) is the influence of the immediate working environment. In short, they have
gone native in the social services milieu. The other set is the managers of social services
who have built careers in the post-New Public Management world where budgetary disci-
pline and financial creativity are taken-for-granted parts of their professional expertise. The
danger to the practice of social accounting for the former group is that the changes in the
organisation of local government finance function which strengthen the corporate core and
weaken local service autonomy, mean that the chances of absorbing service values have
been (deliberately?) weakened.
As actors ourselves, one (somewhat remote, perhaps) possibility is to engage accountants
in local government in a social accounting agenda (cf. McPhail, 2003; ODwyer, 2001).
As Gray (1992, p. 401; and see Shearer, 2002) has stressed, part of any transition towards
recognition of the moral dimensions of economic activity implies a need for accountants
to first identify the cage in which we place ourselves through economic thought . . .. And
as Mouritsen et al (2002, p. 507) argue, a critical point is to accord agency to all systems
elements. Indeed, our work at Eastmet and Southshire indicates that accountants in these
organisations have a certain consciousness of the dangers and ethical implications of their
processes of transforming social qualities into money metrics via the budgeting process (see
Meyer, 1986, p. 349). We have already noted some of their comments about the need to
invest in childrens social services, and we found further illustrations of their consciousness
of the moral dimensions of accounting in their discussions of services for the elderly. The
following quotations, for example, are from the Head of Finance (Adults and Community
Care) at Southshire:
Weve been through several years of reining back on eligibility on social care. Demand
is going through the roof. The SSA [grant] is a form of cut. If you have to go into
Nursing care you can measure your life expectancy in term of 18 months . . . perhaps
6 months. Its not what we came in to this for.
There are very tight eligibility criteria that is our control mechanism . . . the law
says anyone who has social care needs can present themselves and we have to assess
their needs. The criteria matches money accurately to those needs. You basically
ratchet the line up. You have to be 85 with a significant physical or mental health
problem, thats our control mechanism. So there are huge numbers of people local
teams are saying no to. Youd be horrified at people we leave in their own homes.
Local managers are constantly saying no and people in management hold the line,
 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473 469

then it goes to [Council] Members, and the Director [of Social Services] turns round
and says: pay for this person. Its very demoralising for the teams . . .

And, similarly, the following is from the Director of Finance, Eastmet:

Old people weve overestimated how quickly theyre going to die. People in residen-
tial care have been living longer. The government model implied a 6-year turnaround
time. Its actually 7 years. If the model is out by 20%, the funding is out by 20%.

Could accountants in local government mobilize, in the sense of engaging in a critical

social accounting agenda? We have recounted the high points of our interviews with local
government accountants in our fieldwork, where it seems that there is a moral view of
finance and accounting. Accountants also enact a form of social accounting via creative
accountinga term which need not be used pejoratively in local government. Such ideas,
however, are at best resistance to fiscal stress. We find it difficult to conceive of accoun-
tants going much further with social accounting in the sense of recognising (fuller) moral
responsibility.
Whilst accountants are willing to enter into disputes with central government departments
(for example over the current cash-for-schools crisis, Seal & Ball, 2003), ultimately, we
contend, they think in terms of their functional roles and existing routines. Certainly at
Eastmet accountants were happy to talk about the moral or political implications of what
they do, but when asked about the idea of resistance to the current trends in local government
finance, one commented, weve got a Labour government, what more do you want? Yet
we believe that a silent social account (Gray, 2001) informed by insider knowledge from
local authority accountants would have political impact.7 Perhaps retired members might
be cajoled into such a project? What we are envisaging here is an account of the social
that restores the link between what is represented and knowledge of the empirical world,
reinstating context and uncertainty in all its complexity, perhaps even personalising accounts
of activity and people in the community.

5. Discussion and conclusions

At the outset of the paper, we argued that public service organisations generally, and local
government authorities in particular, exist principally for the purpose of the distribution of
societys social resources. Further, we argued that because these organisations are intrinsi-
cally engaged in agendas for social justice, then accounting processes in these organisations
might be key to understanding what social accounting means and how it might make a
difference. The paper therefore set out to understand more about what social account is, and
its utility, by learning from English local government. We did not seek, however, to reify
local government organisations into some ideal. Our review of the problems and reform
agendas and cold social climate under which local authorities labour, however, might go
some way to explaining their seemingly commonplace existence.

7 We are grateful to Colin Dey, University of Dundee, for suggesting this point.
470 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473

Our approach to understanding what social accounting might mean in the context of
local government was to build on Pallots (1991) notion of organic accounting. Pallots
work indicates that such an accounting would build upon an existing system (budgeting)
to invoke a community perspective; shared social values; fairness in the distribution of
resources; or a vision of what a just and socially sustainable community might look like.
At the same time, the paper drew on our recent fieldwork in two contrasting English
local government authorities, focussing on the budgeting process in the context of personal
social services for vulnerable children and adults with personal, practical and emotional
problems. This focus means that the study was limited in the sense that we cannot claim to
have analysed a social accounting system per se. The budgeting process in local government,
however, has long been recognised as a political processin other words, it creates a space
in which people may voice arguments for the distribution of resources and invoke the social
factors envisaged as key to a social accounting process.
Worryingly, however, our fieldwork indicated that in spite of the involvement of
Southshire and Eastmet in a social agenda, the potential of social accounting is not reflected
in the predominant accounting system. Budgeting in Southshire and Eastmet is fettered by
the tyrannies of incrementalism and short-term decisions. There is a pervasive sense of
financial crisis, which obscures the value of long-term thinking about the social costs of our
current ways of life (manifest, for example, in toxic babies at Eastmet); whether these
costs are too high; and what might be done about it.
The particular contribution of this paper is the idea of enacted social accounting. Our
findings indicate that social accounting might not exist at a systems level. Rather, social
accounting seems to be a matter of what is enacted and accommodated within a system.
We argued for a focus on episodes in organisational life in order to understand how social
accounting might be mobilized and the possibility of change (building on existing strug-
gles/social problems or existing ethical reserves). At Southshire and Eastmet enacted social
accounting is manifest in accountants, managers and politicians using the budget as an
enabler for the achievement of social goals. At Southshire, the covert use of the budget by
politicians to fund travellers childrens education demonstrates an enacted social account-
ing characterised by discretion rather than visibility in the face of a hostile constituency.
At Eastmet, accountants and mangers act to ensure funding for placements for toxic babies
rather than publicising the chasm between (short- and long-term) resource needs for chil-
drens services and the budget. At Southshire, managers similarly continue to pressure the
budget system to enable the short-term funding to ensure that vulnerable children are looked
after in a system which has avoided investment in long-term capacity.
Enacted social accounting reflects politicians, accountants and managers understand-
ing of the moral dimensions of accounting systems. The utility of enacted social accounting
relates to the achievement of short-term social goals where social injustices persist (trav-
ellers children who the educational system fails) or where particular social problems are
manifest and visible (toxic babies). These conclusions echo the conclusions of Cooper et
al. (2005) who suggest that social accounting as necessarily linked to contemporary social
struggles and groups if it is to have impact.
A key point to note from our findings is that social struggles may be manifest within
as much as outside organisations. We have noted the cold climate which English local
authorities must weather. Whilst it may be possibly be true as a generalisation that individual
 A. Ball, W. Seal / Accounting Forum 29 (2005) 455473 471

service users are self-seeking and short-sighted in relation to paying for welfare services,
it seems that the people through whom their demands are channelled are able to reflect
different attitudes and values. The corollary, as Stoker (2001) has noted, is that there may
only be a handful of individuals engaged fairly directly and actively in local government
activity, and who are really interested in the justice dimensions of providing services for
vulnerable people.
We see the further development of social accounting, however, as fundamentally con-
strained by the failure of managers and (particularly) accountants to engage more fully with
their moral responsibilities towards a just society. Accordingly, we challenge local govern-
ment accountants to engage with notions of social accounting, since they are implicated
through their knowledge that they are keeping the real values invisible (Boyce, 2000,
p. 30; and see Meyer, 1986) in the context of obvious areas that would be covered by a
social account. The underlying motivation should be about confronting the appropriateness
of economic models of governance, and acting out of a sense of moral responsibility in
attaining a vision of a just society. In so doing, the question becomes whether there might
be, beyond central government rhetoric, an alternative future for local government, which
draws its inspiration from notions of social justice. Ultimately, we may wish to establish
links between social justice, environmentalism and localism as these are all arraigned against
globalising capital.
We see social accounting in public service organisations generally as crucial to advanc-
ing an agenda for the social justice dimensions of sustainability. This paper has attempted
to examine how social accounting might allow for extending the domain of social concep-
tualisation in relation to the institution of local government. We argue that there is scope
for similar explorations in the context of health and other public services. Given our (opti-
mistic) findings in relation to enacted social accounting, we also see empirical research
into the ethical and social motivations of public service accountants and policy makers as
potentially fruitful.

Acknowledgements

We are grateful for the financial support of the Chartered Institute of Management
Accountants (UK) for this work. We are also indebted to two anonymous referees for
their comments and support.

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