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“A war waged with numbers”: Accounting and accumulation by alienation in Australia’s border industrial complex

Matthew Scobie (University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand)
Lila Laird (University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand)

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal

ISSN: 0951-3574

Article publication date: 15 May 2024

Issue publication date: 1 October 2024

62

Abstract

Purpose

This paper explores the role of accounting and accountability techniques in contributing to Australia’s border industrial complex.

Design/methodology/approach

We use the political thought of Behrouz Boochani to explore the role that accounting techniques play at the micro and macro level of his dialectic of alienation and freedom. Firstly, we explore the accounting and accountability techniques detailed in Boochani’s No Friend but the Mountain, which gives an account of his life in Manus Prison, and the accounting techniques he experienced. Secondly, we explore the discourse of alienation created within the annual reporting of the Australian Federal Government regarding the border industrial complex.

Findings

We argue that the border industrial complex requires the alienation of asylum seekers from their own humanity for capital accumulation, and that accounting and accountability techniques facilitate this form of alienation. These techniques include inventorying, logging and queuing at the micro level within Manus Prison. This alienates those trapped in the system from one another and themselves. Techniques also include annual reporting at a macro level which alienates those trapped in the system from the (White) “Australian Community”. However, these techniques are resisted at every point by assertions of freedom.

Originality/value

We illustrate the role of accounting in accumulation by alienation, where the unfreedom of incarcerated asylum seekers is a site of profit for vested interests. But also that this alienation is resisted at every point by refusals of alienation as assertions of freedom. Thus, this study contributes to the accounting literature by drawing from theories of alienation, and putting forward the dialectic of alienation and freedom articulated by Boochani and collaborators.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

Profound thanks go to Behrouz Boochani for all the work that he does. We would also like to acknowledge Te Maire Tau and Paul Schwalger at the Ngāi Tahu Research Centre. Sarah Alwan helped with data collection, and we appreciate the constructive comments from two anonymous reviewers that advanced the paper.

Citation

Scobie, M. and Laird, L. (2024), "“A war waged with numbers”: Accounting and accumulation by alienation in Australia’s border industrial complex", Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 37 No. 7/8, pp. 1795-1819. https://doi.org/10.1108/AAAJ-11-2023-6723

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2024, Emerald Publishing Limited

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