Analyse the key developments in social accounting and discuss the Essay

Analyse the key developments in social accounting and discuss the extent to which you agree with the academic criticism of these developments - Essay Example Typically, social accounting stresses the idea of corporate accountability and has been defined in this context as an approach to reporting of the activities of a firm that stresses on identifying socially appropriate behavior, acknowledging the people to whom the company is answerable for its performance socially and development of suitable measures as well as reporting methods. It is a significant step towards assisting companies to develop autonomously CSR initiatives that have demonstrated to have more effectiveness compared to those that have been mandated by the government (Crane and Matten, 2007, p. 170). In most cases, social accounting is a collective term that is employed in describing a wide field of practice and research so the usage of narrower terms in the expression of particular interests is therefore not uncommon. For instance, environmental account may particularly denote the research or practices of accounting for the effects of an organization on the natural environment. On the other hand, sustainability accounting is employed in the expression of quantitative analysis and measuring of economic and social sustainability (Thomas and Lamm, 2015, p. 191). J R Hicks originally introduced the phrase social accounting into the field of economics in 1942 and he defined it as nothing else apart from accounting for the entire community or nation in the same manner that private accounting refers to accounting for one organization. According to Hicks, social accounting can also be referred to as national income accounting and is a means of presenting the inter-connections between various sectors of the economy in a statistical manner for a comprehensive understanding of the economic environment of the environment. It is an approach that can be used to study the structure of economic bodies and can be used as a means of presenting information concerning nature of the economy with the