Accounting and Order

Book excerpt: The role of accounting in constructing and sustaining order in organizations and society is little understood. This book aims to contribute to the accounting literature at two levels. First, it aims to explore the role of accounting technologies in constructing and underpinning order. Second, it seeks to develop a better understanding of accounting practice in the ancient world, drawing in particular on the case of ancient Egypt. The author provides a conceptual treatment of the notion of order and then draws on evidence from ancient Egypt to illustrate and articulate the notion of order and the roles of accounting technologies in constructing and underpinning order. Despite the voluminous literature on ancient Egypt, very little is known about accounting and control practices in this civilisation. This book fills a major gap in the market bringing together, analyses and theorises accounting inscriptions from the various historical episodes of ancient Egypt. A special feature of the book is to examine the role of accounting in constructing and sustaining political, social and economic order. Such an emphasis is not only lacking in the literature on ancient history, but is also hardly addressed in any explicit manner in the extant literature on accounting generally, whether ancient or contemporary.