Professionalisation, Power and Empire: Accountancy in British India, 1913–1932

IF 5.7 2区管理学 Q1 BUSINESS, FINANCE

Critical Perspectives on Accounting Pub Date : 2025-01-23 DOI:10.1016/j.cpa.2024.102783

Shraddha Verma , Suki Sian

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Abstract

In most non-white British colonies, the professionalisation process did not begin until political independence had been achieved and a path established to accomplish the indigenisation of national institutions. However, the case of India stands out as the only such colony in which Indian accountants were already in practice and the professionalisation process was already in train well before independence was achieved in 1947. This study examines key developments in the professionalisation of accountancy in British India from 1913 to 1932. Through the examination of archival data, the study explores the complexity of engagement between actors in the accounting field in this period in relation to the promulgation of audit legislation. Drawing on Bourdieu’s work, the study focusses on what was at stake for each group in the accounting field and draws attention to the power differentials that contributed to the acquiescence of Indian practitioners as they navigated the new regulations for auditors imposed by the British Government of India.

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专业化、权力与帝国：英属印度的会计，1913-1932

在大多数非白人英国殖民地，专业化进程直到实现政治独立和建立实现国家机构本土化的道路才开始。然而，印度的情况引人注目，因为它是唯一一个印度会计师已经在执业的殖民地，而且专业化进程早在1947年独立之前就已经开始了。本研究考察了1913年至1932年英属印度会计专业化的关键发展。通过对档案数据的检查，本研究探讨了这一时期与审计立法颁布有关的会计领域行动者之间参与的复杂性。借鉴布迪厄的工作，该研究集中于会计领域中每个群体的利害关系，并提请注意权力差异，这种差异导致印度从业人员在应对印度英国政府强加的审计人员新规定时默许。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Critical Perspectives on Accounting BUSINESS, FINANCE-

CiteScore

9.40

自引率

7.80%

发文量

期刊介绍： Critical Perspectives on Accounting aims to provide a forum for the growing number of accounting researchers and practitioners who realize that conventional theory and practice is ill-suited to the challenges of the modern environment, and that accounting practices and corporate behavior are inextricably connected with many allocative, distributive, social, and ecological problems of our era. From such concerns, a new literature is emerging that seeks to reformulate corporate, social, and political activity, and the theoretical and practical means by which we apprehend and affect that activity. Research Areas Include: • Studies involving the political economy of accounting, critical accounting, radical accounting, and accounting''s implication in the exercise of power • Financial accounting''s role in the processes of international capital formation, including its impact on stock market stability and international banking activities • Management accounting''s role in organizing the labor process • The relationship between accounting and the state in various social formations • Studies of accounting''s historical role, as a means of "remembering" the subject''s social and conflictual character • The role of accounting in establishing "real" democracy at work and other domains of life • Accounting''s adjudicative function in international exchanges, such as that of the Third World debt • Antagonisms between the social and private character of accounting, such as conflicts of interest in the audit process • The identification of new constituencies for radical and critical accounting information • Accounting''s involvement in gender and class conflicts in the workplace • The interplay between accounting, social conflict, industrialization, bureaucracy, and technocracy • Reappraisals of the role of accounting as a science and technology • Critical reviews of "useful" scientific knowledge about organizations