Abstract
Laurie Mook, the editor, provides an introductory overview of social accounting for different types of organizations who have a social mission, as well as social accounting models developed during its history. Summary paragraphs are useful for readers to quickly capture what each of the following cases is about, in which context the social accounting model has been applied, and what contributions have been made to social accounting practice.
The main body of this work contains six case studies by different authors in which social accounting models have been developed to serve various types of organizations in different culture and country contexts. The first case study focuses on stewardship building through the development of a social accounting model in Falkland, which is a village on the east coast of Scotland. The organizational forms involving in the social accounting model include private trusts (the Falkland Estate Trust and Falkland Heritage Trust) as well as a for-profit organization (Falkland Rural Enterprises Limited). This case study illustrates a social accounting model which embeds stewardship of natural, social, cultural, historical, and financial assets within its scope. A series of existing social accounting tools and techniques are also introduced that supports the pursuit of stewardship.
Chapter 3 provides a business model of a fair trade social enterprise (Assisi Organics) which practices social accounting in India. The approaches adopted by Assisi Organics could provide insight for other social enterprise organizations which have a multifold mission (financial, social, and environment, etc.) and contribute to their achieving success.
The third case study focuses on stakeholder engagement in Canada. Consumers’ Community Co-Operative, implements a co-operative social accounting to produce a social report. Although their initiatives were not as effective as expected—the co-operative was dissolved in 2008—the example has led to further social accounting initiatives in the Atlantic Canadian region.
Chapter 5 evaluates Alterna Savings, a credit union, on its micro-loan program in Canada. The authors provided a mixed-method model in social accounting which includes interviews, document review, semi-structures questionnaires and focus groups, online semi-structured survey, case studies, and the Expanded Value Added Statement technique, the evaluation that undertakes the calculation of “hidden” value of non-monetary contributions from the program, such as free services.
Chapter 6 introduces a framework of social accounting to help social enterprise operators and investors assess the performance and the impact through a unique community-based project, the Demonstrating Value initiative in Canada. Thoughtful insights into the interests, needs, and challenges of different parties in the assessment process, as well as a process to develop strong monitoring and reporting systems are provided.
The final case study measures the performance of the nonprofit Convention and Visitor Bureaus (CVBs) created to generate overnight tourist visits to communities in the United States. Traditional CVB performance measures are contrasted with total value performance measures to offer the formulas for calculating net benefits to different parties, including tourism industry, residents, and aggregate society benefits. The evaluation measures emphasize performance reporting which takes multiple indicators into account, in addition to the simple economic and financial indicators that have been used in traditional CVB performance measures.
The next part of this volume focuses on moving social accounting forward. Canadian universities purchasing policies as “sustainable development” are a key focus. The authors collected survey data and conducted follow-up interviews with university procurement managers to investigate to what extent Canadian universities have adopted sustainable purchasing policies and the reasons they made these decisions. They offer a typology of sustainable purchasing policies: general purchasing policies, green purchasing policies, ethical trade purchasing policies, and fair trade purchasing policies.
Chapter 9 by Katherine Ruff provides an overview on the emergence of financial accounting and social accounting, from which readers can gain some understanding on tensions between uniformity and flexibility. Although the author admits the complexity is a by-product of flexibility, Katherine Ruff argues it would still be beneficial to create a social accounting standard.
The last chapter makes connections between the different case studies under certain themes, including diversity and uniformity in social accounting, social accounting and democracy, implications for education, and competencies for social accounting. This chapter is successful in providing certain generalizations for future scholars and practitioners seeking to understand the field of social accounting.
The authors of the case studies have provided a rich and wide range presenting the building and implementing of social accounting. Those cases embrace diverse forms in social economic entities, while spanning in different countries, Canada, the United States, Scotland, and India. As the editor points out in the introductory chapter, a uniform definition of social accounting is hard to achieve due to the diversity in the nature of the organizations seeking to employ the technique. Thus, social accounting requires a close investigation of a rich body of case studies in this field to be understood.
Another remarkable characteristic of this volume is the evaluation of social accounting from a joint perspective of scholars and practitioners. Thus, it employs a case study method that is “less academic,” one that would attract a wider scope of reader groups, especially those who are not familiar with academic papers.
In summary, although most chapters seem to be limited in discussing the possibility of applying the social accounting model to different culture contexts, the work does provide a rich body of case studies in different regions and activity fields which shed light on promoting the social accounting model as an effective and efficient performance measurement for organizations to embrace multiple indicators in a complex social, political, cultural, and economical context.