Social imaginaries: critical imaginaries and Habermas-inspired environmental accounting

Glen Lehman, Renée Palmer and Patricia Walford

Chapter 38 in Handbook of Critical Environmental Accountability and Sustainability, 2026, pp 569-585 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: This chapter explores Habermas's incredibly rich A Theory of Communicative Action and Between Facts and Norms, which have influenced the middle-ground perspective advanced by Jane Broadbent, Richard Laughlin and Michael Power. Their accounting work on accountability mechanisms, critical accounting and public sector accounting issues creates new ways to think about what accounting is, and what it can do. However, examining Habermas's designative understanding of the role of language exposes some procedural problems. A need remains to generate new ideas for reforming accounting and then reinvigorate the public sphere. Notwithstanding the advances made within the various works of Broadbent, Laughlin and Power, another theory of language exists. This expressive conception of language has its roots in the work of Herder and Humboldt. It can be used to examine the limitations of what has been referred to as a designative theory of language. Herder's and Humboldt's work was developed in the twentieth century by Hans Georg Gadamer, who provides important pointers that can guide reform accounting and transcend the limitations of the current social system. An expressive interpretation of the role of language is one step towards refiguring modernity, escaping the circular logic of capitalist modernity, and creating a new accounting.

Keywords: Critical; Habermas; Laughlin; Puxty; Sikka; Social; Imaginary; Realism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781802201765
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