ABSTRACT

The aim of this chapter is to reflect on the role of accounting in attempts to develop controls over professionals. It seeks to provide a link between the ideas of economics and accounting and examine issues of control in a broad sense. A general theme is that many of the changes taking place, particularly in the UK public sector, are ones which have previously been under the control of professionals. The changes taking place are ones which we see as informed by ‘accounting logic’ and which claim their legitimacy through the application of market-type controls. One requirement of the market approach is the possibility of defining what is to be subject to exchange and putting an exchange value on it. The theme of hierarchies, markets and clans (developed in the work of Williamson and Ouchi) will be used as a heuristic to frame the argument that the imposition of market-based controls is essentially ideological. It will be argued that accounting and ‘accounting logic’ is so centrally implicated because it provides the technology to operationalise the controls required to make a market possible. In order to do this the chapter will be structured in the following manner. First, the framework of markets, hierarchies and clans will be introduced. Second, the nature of accounting and ‘accounting logic’ will be explored. The question of how we characterise professions will be the third issue addressed and finally the implications of using market-type controls in a professional context will be examined. The chapter will use the areas of education and primary health care, where the authors have been engaged in extensive research, to provide illustrations of many of the issues discussed.