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Employee and social reporting as a war of position and the union learning representative initiative in the UK

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  • Lee, Bill
  • Cassell, Catherine

Abstract

In the employee reporting and social and environmental accounting and reporting fields, disputes are commonplace between academics who advocate improvements to reporting as a means of making those who control capital more accountable within capitalism and Marxist writers who see such improvements as possible obstacles to a change to an alternative society. Gramsci's war of position concept, which allows the interpretation of progressive change as valuable per se and as having the potential to create the conditions for advancement to an alternative economy, is proposed as a means of resolving these differences. This argument is illustrated by reference to the UK's trade union learning representative initiative.

Suggested Citation

  • Lee, Bill & Cassell, Catherine, 2008. "Employee and social reporting as a war of position and the union learning representative initiative in the UK," Accounting forum, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 276-287.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:accfor:v:32:y:2008:i:4:p:276-287
    DOI: 10.1016/j.accfor.2008.05.001
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Lee, Bill & Cassell, Catherine, 2017. "Facilitative reforms, democratic accountability, social accounting and learning representative initiatives," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 24-37.
    2. Barone, Elisabetta & Ranamagar, Nathan & Solomon, Jill F., 2013. "A Habermasian model of stakeholder (non)engagement and corporate (ir)responsibility reporting," Accounting forum, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 163-181.
    3. Lee, Bill & Carlisle, Liam, 2024. "Interpreting an escape from an eviction trap as a social account: A Gramscian reading of a credit union’s policies in support of social housing tenants," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    4. Lee, Bill, 2010. "The individual learning account experiment in the UK: A conjunctural crisis?," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 18-30.
    5. Mäkelä, Hannele, 2013. "On the ideological role of employee reporting," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 24(4), pages 360-378.
    6. Gilbert, Christine & Everett, Jeff, 2023. "Resistance, hegemony, and critical accounting interventions: Lessons from debates over government debt," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    7. Bigoni, Michele & Mohammed, Sideeq, 2023. "Critique is unsustainable: A polemic," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).

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