Grand challenges are complex, large-scale problems requiring collaborative, multidisciplinary attention. Cross-sector collaboration can potentially play a significant role in addressing these challenges by capturing the diverse vision, experience, knowledge and resources of different sectors. Yet we still know little of the inter-organisational dynamics of how sectors work together to address grand challenges and the consequences of doing so. Our article contributes to the literature at the intersection of management and grand challenges by identifying how cross-sector collaborations can be used more effectively to address grand challenges. Drawing on a study of Australia’s offshore processing of refugees, we highlight the inter-organisational issues that emerge and develop a collaborative governance framework to overcome these problems and guide future cross-sector collaborations directed at grand challenges. JEL Classification: M5, H11
PurposeThis paper aims to generate new research directions at the intersection of accounting, whistleblowing and publicness: defined as the attainment of public goals, interests and values.Design/methodology/approachA problematising review is used to challenge and rethink the existing accounting and whistleblowing literature by incorporating readings from the public interest and public value literature. The paper draws on the work of Dewey (1927), Bozeman (2007) and Benington (2009) to open up new ways of theorising relations between accounting, whistleblowing and publicness.FindingsFirstly, the paper develops a public interest theoretical framework which shows whistleblowing is a public value activity that moves organisational wrongdoing into the public sphere where it is subject to democratic debate and dialogue required to reconcile the public's interests with what the public values. Secondly, this framework provides one answer to continuing questions in the literature of how to define accountings relationship to the public interest. Finally, the paper suggests this conceptual framework be used to stimulate debate on whether and how one should expand existing accounting and accountability knowledge boundaries to incorporate the broader social, political and moral concerns highlighted by whistleblowers acting in the public interest.Originality/valueAccounting and whistleblowing research has ignored the theoretical implications of whistleblowing in the public interest. The paper shows how accounting and accountability can respond to the challenges of a shifting and intangible public interest by providing a conceptual framework to guide current and future theoretical questions of how accounting is connected to the public interest.
This article outlines an innovative project to encourage knowledge sharing and engagement between academics and a policy team within the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C). The project was designed to enhance policy advice by drawing on a group of academics outside the policy ranks to act as a sounding board, to question, and provide differing perspectives within the policy process of crafting advice to government. External expertise and particularly academic research has the potential to improve evidence‐based policy but often fails to be specific or timely for those at the “pointy end” of policy decision making. An informal knowledge sharing framework has the potential to improve the exchange of information through confidential and targeted conversations between researchers and public servants as one way of overcoming these barriers.
This study examines the accounting and accountability practices of Fairtrade International (FLO), one of the largest Fair Trade umbrella organizations. Our aim is to explore whether new forms of accounting and related disclosures emerge in the reporting practices of FLO and how these reflect their self-declared social mission towards the emancipation and sustainability of producers. Using thematic analysis and reflecting on Bourdieu's theory of symbolic power, we analyse FLO's reporting practices from 2006 to 2013. Our findings reveal that FLO mobilises the taken-forgranted images and symbols of 'fairness' in the Fair Trade system by using descriptive statistics of Fair Trade premium distributions and pictures of producers but keeps silent to current concerns surrounding the limitations of Fair Trade. Such findings extend important insights into how new forms of accounting and related disclosure are used to legitimise the practice of Fair Trade.
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