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GUEST EDITORIAL

Accounting and subalternity: enlarging a research space

Cameron Graham
Schulich School of Business, York University, Toronto, Canada
Abstract
Purpose The paper aims to describe the construction of this AAAJ special issue as an exercise in creating and consolidating social space for innovative accounting research. Design/methodology/approach A review of prior literature and the events leading to this AAAJ issue are used to provide a context for the articles appearing in the issue. Findings The paper suggests that accounting research is implicated in subalternity in complex ways, both through its construction of the subject of research and in its attempts to reproduce accounting researchers habituated to Western academic norms and practices. Research limitations/implications The paper sets out some conditions for innovative accounting research on less developed countries and indigenous peoples. Originality/value This journal issue is an attempt to expand research space by bringing together authors from different areas of accounting research, as well as a consolidation of vibrant existing streams of research. The paper introduces the special issue. Keywords Developing countries, Accounting research Paper type General review

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Introduction It is probably only tting that this special issue of Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal began in what was, at least at the time, the centre of Western economic power. In 2005, Danture Wickramasinghe and I met over dinner in New York City. We discussed the similarities between the research he was doing on accounting in less developed countries (LDCs) and the research I was doing on accounting and indigenous peoples. While the subsequent nancial crisis may have shifted the centre of gravity of global capital, there was no doubt in our minds that New York then represented the core of something whose peripheral effects we and many other accounting researchers seek to understand. This AAAJ special issue grew out of our discussion, and the articles here share a central question: What happens when accounting engages the parts of our world that are not already fully integrated into the global economy? This question is certainly germane when looking at less developed countries, where global business interests expand into countries that have so far had little need for sophisticated accounting systems and audited nancial reporting. It is also germane when looking at the situation of indigenous peoples in already developed countries,
The author would like to thank Dean Neu, Marcia Annisette, Danture Wickramasinghe, and Trevor Hopper, as well as the Schulich School of Business and participants at the Accounting and Subalternity Conference held there in August 2007, for their continued support of this project.
Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal Vol. 22 No. 3, 2009 pp. 309-318 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0951-3574 DOI 10.1108/09513570910945633

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where native cultures have been profoundly changed by policies of governments that have often deliberately sought to break down the nations who were there rst and assimilate their people into expansionist Western society[1]. What makes these two areas interesting to accounting researchers is the way that accounting technologies make such practices of domination possible, shaping both the practices themselves and the outcomes, while being themselves transformed, through adaptation and resistance, into new versions of accounting. By examining accounting on the margins of Western society, that is, on the front lines of marginalization, we can learn much about accounting that is not easily perceived by looking, for example, at a Western organization. It is like the difference between studying the geography of an existing land mass and watching a new island form from an active volcano. With the volcano, there is simply a lot of interesting stuff going on. The volcanic activity at the edge of global capitalism has been every bit as violent as the metaphor would suggest. Some of it is lethal, as in the case of Ken Saro-Wiwa[2], and some of it is endemic. Both of the research settings brought together in this AAAJ special issue feature extraordinary poverty. In the one case, an entire country can remain poor relative to Western countries, despite decades of economic activity within its borders by foreign companies. In the other case, an entire people can remain poor relative to the immigrant populations that dominate the economic and political landscape of the country they once had to themselves. For such situations to arise, and to persist, certain technologies of power are required. Among them are the most banal and taken-for-granted, such as accounting. The articles in this issue are thus fundamentally about the relationship between accounting and power. The power of accumulated capital depends on technologies such as accounting to extend its spatial and temporal reach (Miller and OLeary, 1987). Global business interests and Western governments are generally understood to stand on one side of a divide between those who have and those who have not, and it is no coincidence that those who have are big trafckers in accounting information. Yet each of the traditional characterizations of this divide, be it North/South, developed/underdeveloped, Western/non-Western, or First World/Third World, carries a particular and usually binary version of the central problematic, which concerns the historically conditioned, uneven distribution of power and wealth in our world. Many accounting scholars would argue that the notion of a divide, of a binary opposition between haves and have-nots, follows from particular understandings of the nature of power. If power is something that one possesses, then there will be those that have it and those that do not, much as for any other commodity. But other notions of power do not lead us to presume such a divide. Those scholars who have drawn on the work of Foucault, for instance, would say that power and resistance go hand in hand, and that power operates diffusely through a network of agents. Those who have drawn on Bourdieu would say that power is related to diverse forms of capital that are dynamically contested, and hence is always subject to redenition. Those who have drawn on Latour would say that power is a function of networks of human and non-human actants that are constantly being recongured, sometimes increasing and sometimes diminishing in inuence. Accounting scholars have worked to clarify the role of accounting using all of these theorizations of power, and more.

To understand the role of accounting on the margins of Western economic and political power, a diversity of theorizations of power is not only helpful but necessary. Less developed countries have been profoundly affected by the exploitative policies of globalization, through the depletion of natural resources and the transformation of their populations into cheap sources of labour. Indigenous peoples throughout the world, in developed and developing countries alike, have faced what Gallhofer and Chew (2000, p. 260) frankly called cultural breakdown, racism and serious human rights violations. Researchers have found that understanding the role of accounting in these settings demands openness to complex theoretical and methodological tools. However, openness to such tools does not guarantee success in publishing ones research results. One needs space, space to consult supportive colleagues, space to conduct research, and space in interested journals. After our meeting in New York, Danture and I went on to launch, with considerable help from Marcia Annisette, Dean Neu, and Trevor Hopper, a conference to bring together accounting researchers interested in less developed countries and indigenous peoples. It was our hope that we would stimulate relevant theory about accounting and provide a space where new attempts at accounting research could have an initial hearing and receive encouragement. Getting the conference off the ground was a difcult task, in part because we were not sure what to call it. The Conference on Accounting in Less-developed Countries and Accounting for, of, or by Indigenous Peoples was clearly going to be unwieldy. Our rst attempts at something briefer all seemed to truncate some subset of the research we wanted to include. The name Accounting and Subalternity was eventually raised. I know who raised it, but giving them credit might now be perceived as a backhanded complement: subalternity, it turned out, was a contentious word. We had hoped subalternity would capture the disadvantageous side of the inequity we all felt was present in the role of accounting with respect to less developed countries and indigenous peoples. We meant the word generically and pragmatically. However, it was not long in use on our conference website before we were made aware of the proprietary interest some people took in the term. A paper submitted by Patty McNicholas and Maria Humphries, which was eventually presented at the conference, contained the following quotation of Spivak (cited by de Kock, 1992, p. 46):
. . . many people want to claim subalternity. They are the least interesting and the most dangerous. I mean, just by being a discriminated-against minority on the university campus, they dont need the word subaltern . . . They should see what the mechanics of the discrimination are . . . theyre within the hegemonic discourse wanting a piece of the pie and not being allowed, so let them speak, use the hegemonic discourse. They shouldnt call themselves subaltern.

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It is interesting to see a term that could open up our understanding and help us to question our presumptions about accounting being closed down with such zeal. We prefer a more open and pragmatic usage, one that lets it function as a heuristic for empirical research. Spivak (1988) herself describes subalterns as those whose voices are not captured in dominant discourse. If we leave it at that, the term allows researchers to pursue the more open question of how certain voices are ignored, without presuming a specic ontology that would even further exclude some people from our own less-than-dominant research discourse. A pragmatism like this would

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allow researchers to see what it is that is peculiar about accounting as one of the modes of dominance and discourse operating to include some voices and exclude others. Fortunately, the term subalternity caused little consternation amongst would-be conference participants, who happily submitted papers dealing with accounting in Africa, Australia, New Zealand, the Pacic Islands, Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka, India, the UK, and Canada. The conference was held at the Schulich School of Business in Toronto in August 2007. Most of the papers in this AAAJ special issue were initially presented there, and the rest were written later by people who attended. It was certainly our experience at the conference that accounting researchers had little interest in giving the term subalternity any copyrighted status. This is reected in the articles in this issue. Varied in terms of topic, theoretical approach, and methodology, these papers represent well the fruits of our attempt to bring researchers together to share their common concerns and learn from each other. The papers speak for themselves, and perhaps have little need of further introduction. However, on the assumption that a little context is a good thing, let me describe prior attempts to carve out a similar space for research, to which we are much indebted. A literary context Because we have attempted to draw together two research areas, there are two threads to follow in the literature. On indigenous peoples and accounting, the proper place to start is the special issue of AAAJ in 2000, assembled by Gallhofer and Chew (2000). Their AAAJ special issue was a major step in creating space for accounting researchers who want to examine the effects of accounting on indigenous peoples. Accounting research had just begun to turn its attention to indigenous peoples, with AAAJ leading the way. Hooper and Pratt (1995) described how accounting, in late 19th century New Zealand, enabled the interests of European shareholders in a land company to be privileged over those of Maori shareholders. Chew and Greer (1997) questioned the appropriateness of imposing Western notions of accountability on relationships involving indigenous cultures. Articles on accounting and indigenous peoples began to appear in other journals as well around this time (Mayston, 1998; Gallhofer et al., 1999; Neu, 1999; Neu, 2000b). The room opened up by these initial forays into accounting research on indigenous peoples was consolidated by the 2000 special issue of AAAJ (Davie, 2000; Gallhofer and Chew, 2000; Gallhofer et al., 2000; Gibson, 2000; Greer and Patel, 2000; Jacobs, 2000; Neu, 2000a). Since that issue, articles explicitly concerned with indigenous peoples have appeared at the rate of about two per year in leading accounting journals (including Neu, 2001; Preston and Oakes, 2001; Alam et al., 2004; McNicholas et al., 2004; Neu and Graham, 2004; Neu and Heincke, 2004; Davie, 2005; McNicholas and Barrett, 2005; Neu and Graham, 2006; Preston, 2006; Constable and Kuasirikun, 2007; Sian, 2007)[3]. This AAAJ special issue is therefore not an attempt to open up uncharted territories of research, but to help consolidate a small but vibrant area of research and connect it to another somewhat larger one, namely research on accounting in developing countries[4]. The latter is well established as a eld; the review article by Hopper et al. (2009) in this issue provides ample evidence of this, looking at managerial accounting research. I want here simply to note a few examples of non-managerial accounting research on LDCs that have helped pave the way for continued research on this topic.

Pioneering work in this eld was done by a handful of scholars who found an outlet for their work in the International Journal of Accounting Education and Research, including Briston (1978, 1984), Samuels and Oliga (1982), and Hove (1986). Their work looked critically at the role of accounting standards in less developed countries. Briston and Samuels later came together with Wallace (1990) to form an annual review entitled Research in Third World Accounting[5], which I believe was the rst regular series dedicated to this eld of research. Early related research in AAAJ included Ouibrahim and Scapens (1989), who published the results of a eld study on the use of nancial accounting in the construction industry in Algeria, a socialist developing country. They noted an absence of interest in nancial matters on the part of most of the managers they talked to. Olowo-Okere and Tomkins (1998) examined governmental nancial accounting practices in the UK and Nigeria, suggesting that under certain conditions, developing countries can leapfrog over expected stages of practice that have been observed in already developed countries. Goddard and Assad (2006) examined the symbolic use of nancial accounting by NGOs in Tanzania. Both Uddin and Hopper (2003) and Neu et al. (2006) looked at World Bank accounting practices in developing countries. The wide diversity of these research sites is typical of LDC accounting research. This diversity was ably captured in the special issue of Critical Perspectives on Accounting organized by Annisette and Neu (2004) on the subject of accounting and empire. Covering Fiji (Alam et al., 2004), the Gold Coast and Nigeria (Bush and Maltby, 2004), and Ghana (Rahaman et al., 2004), as well Canada, Mexico, and New Zealand in two articles cited above on accounting and indigenous peoples (i.e. McNicholas et al., 2004; Neu and Heincke, 2004), this CPA special issue connected accounting research on LDCs with an understanding of history that resonates in several of the articles to follow in this AAAJ special issue. This resonance is part of what we are trying to celebrate and reinforce with the present special issue. We hoped that through this special issue, researchers looking at indigenous peoples would nd a larger community to speak with, a community that offers diverse and robust examples of research in non-Western contexts. We hoped equally that LDC scholars would have the opportunity to appreciate the attention to historical context and to themes of power, marginalization, and voicelessnesss that characterizes indigenous-peoples research. Whether these hopes will eventually be realized in full, we cannot tell. The evidence in the following pages is promising, though. Articles in this issue Neu et al. (2009) have written a groundbreaking study of the lending practices of international development agencies in El Salvador. They draw into accounting research for the rst time the intensely organic and dynamic socioeconomic theories of Deleuze and Guattari (1987). In contrast to traditional economic approaches to accounting grounded in assumptions of scarcity and the imperative of efciency, this paper emphasizes the role of desire in fueling social and economic transformation. This perspective helps the authors explain the differing trajectories of two international organizations seeking to claim physical and discursive space in El Salvador. Their examination of dynamic assemblages of people, communications, and accounting practices offers accounting researchers new tools and vocabularies for research.

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Jayasinghe and Thomas (2009) provide a nuanced exploration of the oral accounting systems used in indigenous shing practices, based on Kelums ethnographic research in a shing village on the south coast of Sri Lanka. Their paper examines how oral accounting systems are linked to the resilience of traditional social practices in the face of economic development efforts by government and NGOs. Alawattage and Wickramasinghe (2009) have also contributed a study of resistance by poor populations in Sri Lanka, examining the governance structures and accounting practices of a tea plantation. Their study of hidden transcripts attempts to describe the emancipatory aspects of accounting among subaltern Tamils on the plantation and residents of surrounding villages. They explore the opportunities for resistance to everyday domination provided by subaltern accounting methods and accountability networks. Darlene Himick (2009) has contributed a study of the system of private and public pensions in Chile, a country frequently held up by some as a model for privatization of public pensions. Her paper details the role of accounting in the pension system reformation, and links accounting to the resistance of these reforms by organized labour, dissenting members of the Pinochet regime, and some in the pension industry itself. Chris Poullaos (2009), in contrast to the above four papers, takes a very different tack. Instead of looking at accounting practices on the margins of empire, he looks at the roots of subalternity in the imperial centre. He traces the construction of notions of race and the politics of exclusion in the British accounting profession, with a focus on the 1920s when explicit terms like race suddenly appeared in the minutes of chartered accountancy bodies in Britain. The result is a rich historical analysis of how notions of race were developed as barriers to the accounting profession, positing colonial accountants as the racialized and subaltern Other to prevent them from attaining full professional status. Hopper et al. (2009) provide our nal paper, a detailed review evaluating several decades of research on management accounting in less developed countries. They use a cultural political economy framework to make sense of the ndings of 75 research papers written since 1980. The result is a clear and empirically useful description of the relationship between forms of management accounting systems and various ideal and actual stages of transition in developing countries, from colonial despotism to politicised market capitalism. Together these papers offer a breadth of theorization that is quite remarkable. However, they do not provide the geographical coverage that we had originally hoped for. Although 40 per cent of the papers submitted to the Accounting and Subalternity conference dealt with Africa, none of them made their way into this AAAJ special issue. This was a disappointment to me, and it raises an interesting question. How would one go about developing research on a specic geographical area like Africa, or on a specic indigenous people? Much of the research on LDCs in top accounting journals is produced by people from those countries who have taken doctoral training at a European or North American university. In this issue, Hopper et al. (2009, pp. 469-514) refer to the diaspora of accounting scholars from LDCs to rich countries; and Western PhD programs that encourage candidates to conduct indigenous research. A similar note is sounded by Chew and Greer (1997, pp. 291-2) regarding indigenous peoples research and the problem of speaking for others.

In some respects, this relationship between LDCs and the training of accounting scholars is problematic. A non-Western student becomes indoctrinated in European modes of thought and expression. Without this indoctrination, the student will have a hard time of it trying to get published in so-called reputable journals, because the criteria for journal reputation are well entrenched and are decidedly Eurocentric. With this indoctrination, the student may lose some or even much of her advantage over Western students with respect to a novel perspective on research. Similar implications could be expected regarding indigenous peoples research. The alternative to training non-Western students in Western ways would be to ask them to bootstrap their own research programs, with a long and arduous journey for the student in acquiring research skills. Moreover, Western scholars might be left to do research on LDCs and indigenous peoples without anyone alongside them to give them eld-level experience. Cultural appropriation is the phrase that comes to mind. Despite these interesting problems, we muddle through by continuing to recruit students from LDCs and trying to help them develop their own voice. Ideally, this is as much a learning experience for the doctoral supervisor as it is for the student. We appear to be less successful in developing scholars amongst indigenous peoples, judging by the effective absence of accounting research by Maoris, Australian aboriginals, and members of Canadas First Nations. Conclusion Producing a special issue like this one is explicitly an exercise in promoting research on LDCs and indigenous peoples, and as such it is not independent of the phenomenon of training non-Western students in Western universities. Nor is it in any way independent of the problems associated with postulating the Other as an object of academic research (Said, 1979). Such problems are inescapable, and can only be acknowledged humbly. We hope this issue, Accounting and Subalternity, will be received as a genuine attempt to help scholars stake out space in which their research can happen, and to give that space a name. Whether the name accounting and subalternity is helpful remains an empirical question. We have rather arbitrarily excluded many important aspects of the study of accounting on the margins of Western society, including gender and race. However, we have struck some sort of a chord, at least to judge by the enthusiasm with which this topic was greeted by conference participants and the efforts that were put into the papers in this issue. Is it proper to set such arbitrary boundaries around research? The answer depends on the permeability and uidity of the boundaries, and the degree to which others are excluded from the benets accruing to those doing research inside them. When the boundaries are permeable, the possibilities of exclusion, and of the appropriation of benets by insiders, are both low. When the boundaries are uid, the attempt to move boundaries becomes an interesting and playful what-if exercise. What if we impose this constraint? What happens if we relax that one? The long term effects of this project, starting at dinner in New York and ending in this AAAJ special issue, cannot be determined yet. However, we who were involved in it all retain the hope that others will benet from the scholarship celebrated here, both for its own sake and for the research communities and research possibilities that it may foster.

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Notes 1. I have adopted the word Western by convention, but as discussed below, any single word would be problematic. Referring to the global economy instead of the West might help in some ways, but would privilege economics as an explanation and ignore aspects of race, for instance. 2. Ken Saro-Wiwa, an author and environmental activist who opposed Shells oil extraction activities in Nigeria, was executed in 1995 by the Nigerian government (Knox, 1995). 3. Other articles on similar themes have appeared in accounting journals, many by these same authors, but the ones cited here explicitly noted their concern with issues related to indigenous peoples. 4. Even this connection is not entirely new. Walker (2003) makes it in his article on the Highland clearances. 5. This annual review is still active under the name Research in Accounting in Emerging Economies, edited by two co-authors of an article in this special issue, Mathew Tsamenyi and Shahzad Uddin. References Alam, M., Lawrence, S. and Nandan, R. (2004), Accounting for economic development in the context of post-colonialism: the Fijian experience, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 15 No. 1, pp. 135-57. Alawattage, C. and Wickramasinghe, D. (2009), Weapons of the weak: subalterns emancipatory accounting in Ceylon tea, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 22 No. 3, pp. 379-404. Annisette, M. and Neu, D. (2004), Accounting and empire: an introduction, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 15 No. 1, pp. 1-4. Briston, R. (1978), The evolution of accounting in developing countries, International Journal of Accounting Education and Research, Vol. 14 No. 1, pp. 105-20. Briston, R. (1984), Accounting standards and host country control of multinationals, British Accounting Review, Vol. 16 No. 1, pp. 12-26. Bush, B. and Maltby, J. (2004), Taxation in West Africa: transforming the colonial subject into the governable person, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 15 No. 1, pp. 5-34. Chew, A. and Greer, S. (1997), Contrasting world views on accounting accountability and aboriginal culture, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 10 No. 3, pp. 276-98. Constable, P. and Kuasirikun, N. (2007), Accounting for the nation-state in mid nineteenth-century Thailand, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 20 No. 4, pp. 574-619. Davie, S.S.K. (2000), Accounting for imperialism: a case of British-imposed indigenous collaboration, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 330-59. Davie, S.S.K. (2005), The politics of accounting, race and ethnicity: a story of a chiey-based preferencing, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 16 No. 5, pp. 551-77. de Kock, L. (1992), Interview with Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak: New Nation Writers Conference in South Africa, Ariel, Vol. 23 No. 3, pp. 29-47. Deleuze, G. and Guattari, F. (1987), A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, MN. Gallhofer, S. and Chew, A. (2000), Introduction: accounting and indigenous peoples, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 256-67.

Gallhofer, S., Haslam, J., Kim, S.N. and Mariu, S. (1999), Attracting and retaining Maori students in accounting: issues, experiences and ways forward, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 10 No. 6, pp. 773-807. Gallhofer, S., Gibson, K., Haslam, J., McNicholas, P. and Takiari, B. (2000), Developing environmental accounting: insights from indigenous cultures, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 381-409. Gibson, K. (2000), Accounting as a tool for Aboriginal dispossession: then and now, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 289-306. Goddard, A. and Assad, M.J. (2006), Accounting and navigating legitimacy in Tanzanian NGOs, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 19 No. 3, pp. 377-404. Greer, S. and Patel, C. (2000), The issue of Australian indigenous world-views and accounting, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 307-29. Himick, D. (2009), Accounting and Chilean pension reform, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 22 No. 3, pp. 405-28. Hooper, K. and Pratt, M. (1995), Discourse and rhetoric: the case of the New Zealand Native Land Company, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 8 No. 1, pp. 10-37. Hopper, T., Tsamenyi, M., Uddin, S. and Wickramasinghe, D. (2009), Management accounting in less developed countries: what is known and needs knowing, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 22 No. 3, pp. 469-514. Hove, M. (1986), Accounting practices in developing countries: colonialisms legacy of inappropriate technologies, International Journal of Accounting Education and Research, Vol. 22 No. 1, pp. 81-100. Jacobs, K. (2000), Evaluating accountability: nding a place for the treaty of Waitangi in the New Zealand public sector, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 360-80. Jayasinghe, K. and Thomas, D. (2009), The preservation of indigenous accounting systems in a subaltern community, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 22 No. 3, pp. 351-78. Knox, P. (1995), Saro-Wiwas execution sparks global outrage: Nigerian writer hanged with eight other minority-rights activists, Globe and Mail, November, Vol. 11, p. A1. McNicholas, P. and Barrett, M. (2005), Answering the emancipatory call: an emerging research approach on the margins of accounting, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 16 No. 4, pp. 391-414. McNicholas, P., Humphries, M. and Gallhofer, S. (2004), Maintaining the Empire: Maori womens experiences in the accountancy profession, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 15 No. 1, pp. 57-93. Mayston, D.J. (1998), Devolved budgeting, formula funding and equity, Management Accounting Research, Vol. 9, pp. 37-54. Miller, P. and OLeary, T. (1987), Accounting and the construction of the governable person, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Vol. 12 No. 3, pp. 235-65. Neu, D. (1999), Discovering indigenous peoples: accounting and the machinery of Empire, Accounting Historians Journal, Vol. 26 No. 1, pp. 53-82. Neu, D. (2000a), Accounting and accountability relations: colonization, genocide and Canadas rst nations, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 268-88. Neu, D. (2000b), Presents for the Indians: land, colonialism and accounting in Canada, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Vol. 25 No. 2, pp. 163-84. Neu, D. (2001), Banal accounts: subaltern voices, Accounting Forum, Vol. 25 No. 4, pp. 319-33.

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Neu, D. and Graham, C. (2004), Accounting and the holocausts of modernity, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 17 No. 4, pp. 578-603. Neu, D. and Graham, C. (2006), The birth of a nation: accounting and Canadas rst nations, 1860-1900, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Vol. 31 No. 1, pp. 47-76. Neu, D. and Heincke, M. (2004), The subaltern speaks: nancial relations and the limits of governmentality, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 15 No. 1, pp. 179-206. Neu, D., Everett, J. and Rahaman, A.S. (2009), Accounting assemblages, desire, and the body without organs: a case study of international development lending in Latin America, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 22 No. 3, pp. 319-50. Neu, D., Ocampo, E., Graham, C. and Heincke, M. (2006), Informing technologies and the World Bank, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Vol. 31 No. 7, pp. 635-62. Olowo-Okere, E. and Tomkins, C. (1998), Understanding the evolution of government nancial control systems, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 11 No. 3, pp. 309-31. Ouibrahim, N. and Scapens, R. (1989), Accounting and nancial control in a socialist enterprise: a case study from Algeria, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 2 No. 2, pp. 7-28. Poullaos, C. (2009), Profession, race and empire: keeping the centre pure, 1921-1927, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 22 No. 3, pp. 429-68. Preston, A.M. (2006), Enabling, enacting and maintaining action at a distance: an historical case study of the role of accounts in the reduction of the Navajo herds, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Vol. 31 No. 6, pp. 559-78. Preston, A. and Oakes, L. (2001), The Navajo documents: a study of the economic representation and construction of the Navajo, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Vol. 26 No. 1, pp. 39-71. Rahaman, A.S., Lawrence, S. and Roper, J. (2004), Social and environmental reporting at the Vra: institutionalised legitimacy or legitimation crisis?, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 15 No. 1, pp. 35-56. Said, E. (1979), Orientalism, Vintage Books, New York, NY. Samuels, J.M. and Oliga, J.C. (1982), Accounting standards in developing countries, International Journal of Accounting Education and Research, Vol. 17 No. 1, pp. 69-82. Sian, S. (2007), Reversing exclusion: the Africanisation of accountancy in Kenya, 1963-1970, Critical Perspectives in Accounting, Vol. 18, pp. 831-72. Spivak, G.C. (1988), Can the subaltern speak?, in Nelson, C. and Grossberg, L. (Eds), Interpretation of Culture, University of Illinois Press, Urbana, IL, pp. 271-313. Uddin, S. and Hopper, T. (2003), Accounting for privatisation in Bangladesh: testing World Bank claims, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 14 No. 7, pp. 739-74. Walker, S.P. (2003), Agents of dispossession and acculturation. Edinburgh accountants and the highland clearances, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 14 No. 8, pp. 813-53. Wallace, R.S.O. (1990), Accounting in developing countries: a review of the literature, Research in Third World Accounting, Vol. 1, pp. 3-54. Corresponding author Cameron Graham can be contacted at: cgraham@schulich.yorku.ca

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