Performing business and social innovation through accounting inscriptions: An introduction

This introductory essay tries to provide a space for reflecting on the implications of the move from conceiving of accounting as representations to accounting as inscriptions for a critical and interdisciplinary approach to ac- counting studies. It aims to offer a venue for reflecting on whether there is a positive role that accounting inscriptions play beyond a positivist belief in its representational powers and a constructivist approach that leads to the creation of powerful and dominating institutions such as ‘accounting’. We would like to foster a debate on how accounting practices can be re-designed to perform a proactive role in prompting managerial innovation, different forms of empowerment, development of pragmatic management solutions and the mediation of mul- tiple organizational, social and economic interests in the tradition of those accounting studies that expose the emancipatory and enabling effects of accounting practices while maintaining a critical and intellectually solid stance.