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The United Nations Guiding Principles locate human rights at the centre of the corporate social responsibility agenda and provide a substantial platform for the development of business and human rights policy and practice. The initiative gives opportunity and focus for the rethinking and reconfiguration of corporate accountability for human rights. It also presents a threat: the danger, as we see it, is that the Guiding Principles are interpreted and implemented in an uncritical way, on a “humanitarian” model of imposed expertise. The critical and radical democratic communities have tended to be, perhaps rightly, suspicious of rights talk and sceptical of any suggestion that rights and the discourse of human rights can play a progressive role. The purpose of this paper is to explore these issues from a radical perspective.

This paper uses insights taken from Jacques Rancière’s work to argue that there is vital critical potential in human rights. There is an obvious negativity to Rancière’s thought insofar as it conceives of the political as a challenge to the existing social order. The positive dimension to his work, which has its origins in his commitment to and tireless affirmation of the fact of equality, is equally important, if perhaps less obvious. Together the negative and positive moments provide a dynamic conception of human rights and a dialectical view of the relation between human rights and the social order, which enables us to overcome much of the criticism levelled at human rights by certain theorists.

Rancière’s conception of the political puts human rights inscriptions, and the traces of equality they carry, at the heart of progressive politics. The authors close the paper with a discussion of the role that accounting for human rights can play in such a democratic politics, and by urging, on that basis, the critical accounting community to cautiously embrace the opportunity presented by the Guiding Principles.

This paper has some novelty in its application of Rancière’s thinking on political theory to the problems of critical accounting and in particular the critical potential of accounting and human rights. The paper makes a theoretical contribution to a critical understanding of the relationship between accounting, human rights, and democracy.

This paper aims to trace the genealogy of state violence on Palm Island to argue forms of “colonial” control over Indigenous governance and organisational life persist in Australia. Using Agamben's theories of homo sacer, sovereign power and state of exception, the paper seeks to reveal the biopolitical nature of two centuries of abuses against Indigenous Australians. Arguably, past and recent tragedies on Palm Island show how juridico‐political regimes continue to subvert the citizenship and human rights of many Indigenous Australians – their sovereignty, governance structures and organisations. The purpose of the paper is to develop a greater focus in postcolonial writing on current political issues, by combining critical theory with grounded narratives of lived experiences and contemporary events.

Insights from political theorist Agamben are used to critically analyse the management of violence on Palm Island. The paper draws on documents from the public record, such as historical accounts, legislation, parliamentary Hansard and records of government inquiries, as well as first hand media commentaries of recent events. These textual data form the empirical and evidentiary base from which broader theoretical conceptualisations of this case are discussed.

The paper finds the lingering effects of past exclusion/s are inscribed in the discursive environment and continue to animate the power relations that effect the life and death experiences of Indigenous Australians today. It finds utility and relevance in applying Agamben's theories of the camp, state of exception and homo sacer, to extend postcolonial understandings of contemporary Indigenous contexts. The legitimacy and derivative power of organizations is compromised during times of “exception” and this raises important theoretical issues worthy of further exploration from both a critical management studies and postcolonial perspective.

This paper applies Agamben's theories in an original way to the postcolonial context. It extends theoretical understandings of racial oppressions and organisational consequences.

The paper examines how accounting and accounting experts provided important contributions to the Italian government's strategy to address the COVID-19 emergency in 2020, especially in terms of implementing new rules of conduct and providing justification for penetrating interventions in the life of individuals.

The paper adopts an interdisciplinary approach by drawing upon Agamben's concepts of the state of exception, bare life and biosecurity to understand the purposes of the decrees issued by the Italian government and data provided to the citizens in the “daily bulletin” on the crisis by the Civil Protection Department.

Accounting data provided essential contributions to the government's strategy that sought to spread disquiet and uncertainty in the population to ensure compliance with the strict rules in place, thereby sustaining the management of the country under a state of exception.

The study draws attention to the way in which accounting provides justification for measures that are promoted as provisional but which have enduring effects, most importantly the ability of governments in the future to suspend the rights of individuals. It shows how accounting can influence people's behaviour and contribute to the development of a permanent state of exception that significantly increases government prerogatives.

The work contributes to the literature on accounting and emergencies by studying the use of accounting information as a subtle means to ensure support for extreme government actions and ultimately as a political tool that promotes biosecurity as a new government paradigm.

This study examines how accounting practices used by Deutsche Bank could conceal its role in the destruction of Jewish financial life (bios) as part of the Nazis' Aryanisation policy to eliminate Jews from German business as a prelude to their annihilation.

This study uses a close-reading method that draws upon a wide range of primary and secondary sources. The study is informed by Giorgio Agamben's theorisations on the state of exception and the duality of the example and exception.

The successful implementation of the Nazis' corporative economic model necessitated the cooperation of Aryan businesses to instrumentalise the financially exploitative process of Aryanisation. Accounting was part of the Nazi-Deutsch rhetoric used to disguise expropriation of Jewish businesses and other assets and, thereby, facilitate the eradication of the financial bios of Jews who owned German banks. Unknown to the Nazi authorities, Deutsche Bank, while a significant medium for Aryanisation, sought to ameliorate the long-term effects on Jewish owners, thereby recognising that not all those within Nazi Germany were fully committed disciples of Nazism.

The findings of this study identify how accounting practices were part of a Nazi policy designed to eliminate Jews from the German economy. The use of accounting as a form of “Nazi-Deutsch” functioned to disguise Aryanisations. The importance of these contributions of accounting practices calls for further research into the role of business and accounting in the attempted eradication of people.

The paper is the first to consider the process of Aryanisation in Nazi Germany (1933–1945) as a specific historiographical subject. Presented through the examination of the Aryanisation actions of Deutsche Bank, this study demonstrates the tension between Nazi ideology, the capitalist model and the culpability of accounting practices as a means to reinterpret morality to create the exception that allowed the Nazis to effectively remove all legal protections for Jews.

The purpose of this paper is to articulate an ontological anarchist approach for an engaged post-human politics and present insurrection training as a pragmatic tool for researchers to directly transform the world.

The paper analyses how post-humanism has been criticised for dissolving political agency. It shows that this is due to the way post-humanism has been framed as sensitising and including non-humans into liberal politics. Instead, the paper examines anarchist-influenced post-humanism and combines this with the notion of multiple ontologies and ontological interventions. The paper presents the notion of insurrection training as offering the possibility for researchers to become emotionally sensitised to ontological difference. A case study of the “Seeds of Hope East Timor Ploughshares action” (1996) is used to illustrate what insurrection training and ontological interventions look like in practice. Finally, the paper makes suggestions as to how post-human researchers can apply this approach in their everyday lives.

The paper suggests that beyond a liberal framing of post-humanism as inclusion, there is also an ontological anarchist post-humanism that can support transformative impacts in the world. This form of post-humanism offers specificity of intervention and reflexive training practices. Insurrection training can offer new possibilities for post-humanist researchers: experience ontological difference, de-trivialise the everyday, connect to social movements, make post-human politics “doable” and offer “direct” change.

The paper addresses discussions that claim post-humanism is disabling political change. Its contribution is to map an anarchist post-humanism and extend this with concepts of multiple ontologies. It proposes the notion of insurrection training which places attention on the role of the researcher as an active agent that needs to be sensitised to ontological difference to carry out interventions. A case study of direct action illustrates what ontological intervention and insurrection training look like in practice. The case study suggests that insurrection training is an everyday performative practice that integrates and negotiates the personal, material and political. Finally, the paper suggests how researchers can adopt such an approach in their everyday lives.

The central contribution of the paper aims to provide a new way of thinking and reflecting about using a more critical public policy approach as opposed to the heretofore dysfunctional dichotomist approach common to the immigration policy debate.

Using critical theoretical approaches primarily based on Debord and Agamben, the author compares and contrasts the approaches made by immigration reform policy advocates and opponents to obtain a better understanding of these complex issues and the motivations behind them.

Viewing the policy immigration and border policy discourse from the market spectacle lens allows the author to see the seemingly never-ending conflict to be fully disclosed. Corporate profit-seekers have used effectively the politics of fear surrounding the terrorist attacks of 9-11, the ongoing fear generated against undocumented border crossers along with the property takings of US citizens through the use of the complexities of the dominant market language in the name of the 9-11 and the subsequent War on Terror. The author's primary intention was to expose the motivations of public policy makers and place their policy decisions into a critical context.

In this original paper, the author analyzes events such as the border fence construction – and the corporatist influence behind its development, the push to politically disenfranchise Latinos in Arizona, and the inability of the US Congress to pass legislation for meaningful immigration reform and border security – that have all been subject to the limitations of language, symbols and images portrayed by protagonists and antagonists of market-driven immigration policy. The value of the paper is that the author demonstrates the problems and limitations on public policy.

This study aims to outline an axiology of inclusivity, which can facilitate self-reflection on the possible impact of acting and pursuing a more inclusive branding and marketing for places.

By deconstructing the main assumption, which constitutes the new inclusive paradigm in the marketing and branding of places as more participatory, responsible and democratic, this article tackles critical and pragmatist concerns about the political dimension and its implications for branding and marketing theories and practices in the realm of places.

The article argues that, to be understood and enacted as inclusive, branding and marketing should be seen and act as (bio)political arts of government, characterized by the impolitical as an alternative form of political praxis, whose axiological foundation is based on a particular form of civism, which offers a different mode and stance of approaching political effects and impacts for all stakeholders involved.

Little has been written about the political value, substance and appearance that indicate inclusivity as a fundamental notion for participation, engagement and democracy. This article contributes to the existing literature, arguing that inclusivity should be demystified, as it may present a self-fulfilling discourse that might create political problems.

Why is social action politically so difficult to manage, especially in the field of health and above all when it concerns health care for immigrant populations? This article examines this question by analysing public policies concerning the situation of migrants living with HIV/Aids in France.

Investments in the technologies of borders and their securitisation continue to be a focal point for many governments across the globe. This paper is concerned with a particular example of such technologies, namely, “Big Data” analytics. In the past two years, the technology of Big Data has gained a remarkable popularity within a variety of sectors, ranging from business and government to scientific and research fields. While Big Data techniques are often extolled as the next frontier for innovation and productivity, they are also raising many ethical and political issues. The aim of this paper is to consider some of these issues and provide a critical reflection on the implications of using Big Data for the governance of borders.

The author draws on the example of the new Big Data solution recently developed by IBM for the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service. The system, which relies on data collected from Passenger Name Records, aims to facilitate and automate mechanisms of profiling enable the identification of “high-risk” travellers. It is argued that the use of such Big Data techniques risks augmenting the function and intensity of borders.

The main concerns addressed here revolve around three key elements, namely, the problem of categorisation, the projective and predictive nature of Big Data techniques and their approach to the future and the implications of Big Data on understandings and practices of identity.

By exploring these issues, the paper aims to contribute to the debates on the impact of information and communications technology-based surveillance in border management.

The author presents the experiences of a (re)founding organizer of a local union chapter in South Texas. The union member’s experience in organizational development under circumstances that are politically and economically hostile to employee rights - particularly the ability of faculty associations to offer protection to its membership in the current national anti-union political environment - is evaluated. The case is made here that the State is continually using its sovereign executive and legislative power to extract rights from those whom it makes exceptions, particularly unions. Politicians and higher education executives are simultaneously attempting to remove, effectively weaken and devalue the craftsmanship of worker knowledge at the organizational level. An interpretation of the overall case study is assessed using the knowledge analytic