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1 – 10 of 130David R.J. Moore and Ken McPhail
The purpose of this paper is to utilize the three abstract-concrete levels of ontology of strong structuration theory (strong ST) to examine how, and to what extent, was the…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to utilize the three abstract-concrete levels of ontology of strong structuration theory (strong ST) to examine how, and to what extent, was the development of carbon accounting frameworks at the policy, industry, and organizational levels enabled by external structures as conditions of action, that is, what was the nature of active agency within a field of position-practice relations that led to the development of these frameworks.
Design/methodology/approach
A case study was undertaken drawing upon interviews that were undertaken between 2008 and 2011 at the industry and organizational levels as well as documentary evidence relating to carbon accounting policy development at the macro, or policy level.
Findings
The parliamentary committee hearings into the development of the carbon price legislation represented fields of position-practice relationships which highlighted the interplay of the internal structures, capabilities and the roles of both power and trust of the agent(s)-in-focus. A meso-level analysis of the Victorian water industry highlighted how it was able to mediate the exercise of power by the macro level through the early adoption of carbon accounting frameworks. At the ontic or micro level of the individual water business, the development of a greenhouse strategy was also the outcome of position-practice relationships which highlighted the interplay of the internal structures and dispositions of the agent(s)-in-focus. The position-practice relationships at both the industry and organizational level were characterized by both soft power and trust.
Research limitations/implications
Future research could investigate how the withdrawal of the carbon pricing mechanism in Australia has affected the development of carbon accounting practices whilst overseas research could examine the extent to which carbon accounting frameworks were the outcome of position-practice relationships.
Practical implications
Given the global significance of carbon accounting, this paper provides an overview as to how the early adoption of voluntary carbon accounting practices resulted in a reduction in carbon emissions within the water industry and therefore limited its liability for the carbon price.
Originality/value
This paper illustrates how the strong ST ontological concept of position-practices can be utilized at the macro, meso, and ontic levels and how these relationships mediated the impact of the carbon price upon both the water industry and the individual water business.
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Deema Refai, Nermin Elkafrawi and Peter Gittins
This article aims to explore whether and how rural entrepreneurs (REs) navigate the challenges they face to support rural development, with a particular focus on sustainable…
Abstract
Purpose
This article aims to explore whether and how rural entrepreneurs (REs) navigate the challenges they face to support rural development, with a particular focus on sustainable entrepreneurial development in Jordan.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing on structuration theory (Giddens, 1984), the article is underpinned by the position-practice perspective and its four interrelated elements: praxis, positioning, capabilities and trust. A qualitative methodology is applied to explore the case study of Deserttulip in Jordan and its utilisation of the innovative agricultural Groasis Waterboxx-Technology (GroasisWBT).
Findings
Findings indicate that the position-practice of rural entrepreneurs becomes contextualised between enablers and constraints that shape entrepreneurs' praxis, positioning, capabilities and trust. Pervasive constraints are evidenced by limiting external structures and resources. Yet, these are challenged by enablers observed through the agentic roles of REs and the utilisation of innovative tools in ways that minimise the limitations of constrained contexts.
Practical implications
The article has practical implications within countries with extreme constraints – including environmental (drought), financial and institutional constraints – where collective sustainable initiatives, alongside the utilisation of innovative tools, are called for in order to minimise the impact of limited resources and institutional support whilst promoting empowerment, cohesion and sustainable entrepreneurial development.
Originality/value
The article highlights the specificity of constrained entrepreneurship in ways that allow re-interpreting position-practice of rural entrepreneurs around collective social systems rather than individual entrepreneurs. A sustainable ripple is conceptualised, whereby expanding sustainable entrepreneurial development initiatives are observed around collective acts that stress the accountability and mutual dispositions of rural entrepreneurs towards developing and sustaining their contexts.
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Jari Huikku, Elaine Harris, Moataz Elmassri and Deryl Northcott
This study aims to explore how managers exercise agency in strategic investment decisions (SIDs) by drawing on their knowledgeability of the strategic context. Specifically, the…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to explore how managers exercise agency in strategic investment decisions (SIDs) by drawing on their knowledgeability of the strategic context. Specifically, the authors address the role of position–practice relations and irresistible causal forces in this conduct.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors examine SID-making (SIDM) practices in four case organisations operating in highly competitive markets, conducting interviews with managers at various levels and analysing company documents. Drawing on strong structuration theory, the authors show how managerial decision makers draw upon their knowledge of organisational context when exercising agency in SIDs.
Findings
The authors provide insights into how SIDM behaviour, specifically agents’ conduct, is shaped by a combination of position–practice relations and the agents’ comprehension of their organisation’s context.
Research limitations/implications
The authors extend the SIDM literature by surfacing the issue of how actors’ conjuncturally-specific knowledge of external structures shapes the general dispositions they draw on in exercising agency in practice.
Originality/value
The authors extend the SIDM literature by surfacing the issue of how actors’ conjuncturally-specific knowledge of external structures shapes the general dispositions they draw on in exercising agency in practice. Particularly, the authors contribute to this literature by identifying irresistible causal forces and illuminating why actors might not resist in SIDM processes, despite having the potential to do so.
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Alan Coad, Lisa Jack and Ahmed Othman Rashwan Kholeif
– This paper aims to examine the potential of strong structuration theory in management accounting research.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the potential of strong structuration theory in management accounting research.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper explains how the ontological perspective of strong structuration theory extends the work of Giddens and explores how the perspective overcomes a number of the limitations of existing management accounting research based on structuration theory.
Findings
Strong structuration theory develops and extends the work of Giddens, providing greater insights into the role of agents, improves our understanding of the diffusion of accounting practices through organisational fields, adds to our knowledge of how artefacts are used in the production and reproduction of organisational life and improves research design.
Research limitations/implications
Strong structuration theory provides clear guidance about management accounting case study research design, and suggests the potential for the accounting research community to engage more actively in debates about the development of structuration theory beyond the work of Giddens.
Originality/value
This paper provides a clear explanation of the ontology of strong structuration theory, its implications for research design and how it holds the potential to overcome many of the limitations of earlier management accounting studies deploying structuration theory.
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Elaine Pamela Harris, Deryl Northcott, Moataz Moamen Elmassri and Jari Huikku
In the field of strategic investment decision making (SIDM) a body of research has grown up via international case studies and organisation-based fieldwork. However, there has…
Abstract
Purpose
In the field of strategic investment decision making (SIDM) a body of research has grown up via international case studies and organisation-based fieldwork. However, there has been little systematic theorisation around SIDM processes and practices. The purpose of this paper is to show how strong structuration theory (SST) can be employed to guide how future SIDM studies are conducted and theorised.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors draw upon the concepts from SST to reanalyse prior empirically based work. The authors apply SST-informed analysis to four SIDM case studies selected from the total of 18 published over the period 1970-2016 to explore the utility of SST compared with other approaches.
Findings
The analysis highlights the role of agents’ knowledgeability and position-practice relations in SIDM, which has largely been neglected by prior studies. The authors demonstrate the potential of SST to inform meso-level theorising by applying it to four published case studies. Whilst the authors argue for the adoption of SST, the authors also identify key methodological and conceptual issues in using SST in SIDM research.
Research limitations/implications
The examples and recommendations could assist management accounting researchers, particularly those engaged in case studies and organisational fieldwork, to build knowledge via the improved comparison, integration and theorisation of cases undertaken by different researchers in different contexts.
Originality/value
The authors offer a bridge between SST concepts and case study evidence for theorising, carrying out and analysing case study and field research on SIDM.
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Jean Claude Mutiganda and Janne T. Järvinen
Research was conducted to investigate whether, and how, political accountability might stabilise when agents are faced with profound changes in external structures such as…
Abstract
Purpose
Research was conducted to investigate whether, and how, political accountability might stabilise when agents are faced with profound changes in external structures such as competition laws and austerity policies.
Design/methodology/approach
We performed a field study from 2007 to 2015 in a regional hub in Finland and worked with data from document analysis, interviews and meeting observations. We have used embedded research design, where we apply methodological bracketing as well as composite sequence analysis for field research.
Findings
Accountability declined when irresistible external structures were the dominant influence on the unreflective actions of agents-in-focus. With time, however, the agents started acting critically by drawing on structures that could facilitate strategic actions to stabilise political accountability.
Research limitations/implications
The field research and interpretation of the data were limited to the organisation analysed; however, the theoretical arguments allow for analytical generalisations.
Practical implications
The research demonstrates how public officials and political decision-makers can eventually adopt a strategic approach when faced with irresistible change in external structures.
Social implications
The research demonstrates how public officials and political decision-makers can eventually adopt a strategic approach when faced with irresistible changes in external structures.
Originality/value
The study locates political accountability in the context of strong structuration theory and discusses how it is redefined by external structures.
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Gennaro Maione, Giulia Leoni and Michela Magliacani
This study aims to explore what and how digital innovation, as a knowledge-based and multi-dimensional process, can be used to increase the accountability of public and private…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to explore what and how digital innovation, as a knowledge-based and multi-dimensional process, can be used to increase the accountability of public and private sector organizations during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Design/methodology/approach
Taking an interpretivist approach, qualitative research is designed around Strong Structuration Theory (SST). A content analysis of relevant documents and semi-structured interviews focusing on the relationships between digital innovation and accountability in extraordinary times is conducted.
Findings
The results show the existence of digital innovation barriers and facilitators that can have an impact on accountability during extraordinary times. The research highlights how managers of public organizations focus largely on the social dimension of knowledge (i.e., competencies shaped by collective culture), while managers of private organizations focus mainly on the human dimension of knowledge (i.e., skills gained through learning by doing).
Research limitations/implications
The paper enriches the accountability literature by historicizing SST for extraordinary times and by utilizing a multiple-dimensional approach to digital innovation. Also, the work underlines specific strategies organizations could usefully adopt to improve accountability through digital innovation in the public and private sectors during extraordinary times.
Originality/value
This article emphasizes the crucial integration of technological components with knowledge. In particular, the digital innovation is considered as a strong synergy of human and social dimensions that compels organizations toward enhanced accountability, particularly in the face of extraordinary challenges.
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The purpose of this paper is to provide insights into the importance of accountants’ networks inside organisations, the parties who comprise those networks and how accountants go…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to provide insights into the importance of accountants’ networks inside organisations, the parties who comprise those networks and how accountants go about building and maintaining their networks. It also illustrates the use of strong structuration theory, which specifically considers the networks that surround agents. The theoretical discussion highlights the significance of communication as agency in the context of accounting practice through a strong structuration perspective.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative approach to the inquiry was adopted. Interviews were conducted with 30 Australian accountants from 22 not-for-profit organisations. A thematic approach was used to analyse the transcripts. Structuration theory, supplemented by strong structuration, informed the study.
Findings
The interviewees attested to the importance of communication and developing networks within their organisations. They actively sought to expand and enhance their networks. The accountants played a pivotal role in networks and they pursued both horizontal and vertical relations. The accountants’ knowledge of organisational positions and perceptions of their own roles were used strategically in attempts to alter the internal structures of networked others.
Research limitations/implications
The interviewed accountants worked in not-for-profit organisations and this may influence the findings. Future research might consider accountants working in for-profit organisations. The study provides insights into strategies to develop intra-organisational networks.
Originality/value
The study contributes to the meagre literature regarding accountants’ networks within organisations. It provides insights that may assist accountants in enhancing their own networks. Although structuration theory is well-established in accounting research, the enrichments offered by strong structuration are illustrated in this study.
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The aim of this paper is to present a reinforced version of structuration theory, known as strong structuration theory, set out in Stones as a disciplined approach to qualitative…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this paper is to present a reinforced version of structuration theory, known as strong structuration theory, set out in Stones as a disciplined approach to qualitative case study research in the organization, management and accounting fields. This framework challenges the belief held by certain critics that structuration theory cannot be used in substantive empirical research but is only a sensitising device or analytical tool.
Design/methodology/approach
A conceptual discussion is the approach of the paper.
Findings
The key concepts of strong structuration theory are outlined and then put in the context first of two attempts to apply the framework to empirical research and second of two recent papers which address theoretically informed qualitative research and the use of structuration theory in IT studies.
Research limitations/implications
There are some limitations of this paper. The framework offered was not used to set the original research questions in the two case studies employed as these cases were conducted before the publication of Stones' book in 2005. Also, as weaknesses in the framework can best be assessed using empirical findings, a full evaluation cannot be carried out until such research is undertaken.
Originality/value
This paper draws on recent research and thinking in sociology that have yet to be brought into case studies in the fields of accounting and management in particular.
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Cristiano Busco and Robert W. Scapens
The purpose of this paper is to explore the nature, roles and dynamics of change of management accounting systems (MAS), in processes of continuous organisational learning and…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the nature, roles and dynamics of change of management accounting systems (MAS), in processes of continuous organisational learning and transformation. By studying the interaction between the accounting (and finance) function and the implementation of a Six‐sigma initiative, as the engine for organisational change, the authors seek to uncover the potential of measurement‐based systems of management for aligning business processes with corporate strategies. Such systems sustain continuous processes of transformation by infusing organisational culture with financial and non‐financial metrics of accountability.
Design/methodology/approach
The research is based on a longitudinal case study in which one of the authors had the opportunity to exercise what Schein called the clinical perspective; i.e. combining the role of researcher with that of helper‐consultant. There is mutual interdependence in the relationship between the authors' theoretical framework and the authors' longitudinal case study. While, on the one hand, the case research contributed to the search for an institutional explanation of the evidence experienced and collected, on the other hand, the empirical data are illuminated by the theoretical insights gained from that framework.
Findings
After first discussing cultural change, the authors rely both on the “clinical” position of one of the authors as researcher/helper‐consultant and on the insights provided by Schein's work on organisational culture and Giddens' structuration theory to develop an institutional framework for interpreting the ways in which routinised systems of accountability bind the ongoing processes of cultural transformation across time and space.
Research limitations/implications
Possible limitations are: the conceptualisation of organisational culture as a shared and institutional phenomenon does not take account of wider anthropological aspects (such as the influence of national culture); the role of helper‐consultant as well as researcher may have influenced some of the authors' interpretations; the authors' analysis does not consider macro‐economic variables; and only a small percentage of shop‐floor workers were interviewed.
Originality/value
The paper sheds light on the role of management accounting within organisational processes of transformation far beyond their mere visible enactment. As a result, the authors develop an institutional framework to interpret the linkages between the cognitive dynamics which characterise organisational culture (viewed as shared cognitive schemas) and the behavioural and structural modalities through which they are drawn upon and reproduced by organisational members.
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