Environmental accounting and accountability: can the opaque become transparent?

Abstract

Accounting and the environment can no longer be considered mutually exclusive. Accountability forms part of the philosophical justifications for current accounting practice, and as such, it is a concept that may provide a pivotal grounding upon which environmental issues may be recognised within its practice. This paper examines the radical possibilities of environmental accountability, the contribution that this could make to a new practice of accounting and ultimately, a pathway out of the environmental crisis that could be forged by such changes. Central to the development of the ideas within this work is a critique of the relationship between accountability and transparency.