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Article Information:
Title:
World class manufacturing and accountability: How companies and the state aspire to competitiveness
Author(s):
Trevor Hopper, Mostafa Jazayeri, Chris Westrup
Journal:
Journal of Accounting & Organizational Change
Year:
2008
Volume:
Issue:
Page:
97 - 135
DOI:
10.1108/18325910810878937
Publisher:
Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Acknowledgements:
The authors thank: NWTEC for their generous assistance; help from interviewees and participants at meetings when early versions of this paper were presented – namely an EIASM Workshop on New Directions in Management Accounting, Brussels, December 1998; the Manufacturing Accounting Workshop, Copenhagen Business School, March 1999; Performance Measurement Conference, Cambridge, July 1999; the IPA Conference, Manchester July 2000; and the Seventh Biennial Management Accounting Research Conference, UNSW, Sydney, February 2001; and Colwyn Jones and Mahmoud Ezzamel for incisive comments. The research was funded by a European Regional Development Fund grant.
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Abstract:
Purpose – The paper's aim is to establish how world class manufacturing (WCM) was diffused to some small- and medium-sized enterprises in the NW of England and the network of institutions involved ranging from the state to firms, and to iterate the results with Miller and O'Leary's work on accounting practices and governance.
Design/methodology/approach – This followed an actor network theory approach of “following the actors and actants” using interviews and documentation.
Findings – Three accountabilities (financial, production, and idealised customer) at firm and state levels were linked through agencies like consultants, academics, and employer federations, and quasi-governmental organisations like training and enterprise councils. New discourses and programmes of governance associated with competitiveness fostered changes in accountability locally and nationally. Competitiveness, WCM, and occasional allies like activity-based costing lacked stable and consistent definition. They are adopted and circulate because their plasticity helps actors redefine themselves within translation and mediation processes.
Research limitations/implications – Shop floor workers were not directly studied. Hence, observations on resistance and enactment are tentative.
Practical implications – Continual translations within large networks shape new techniques of management and governance.
Originality/value – The paper shows that programmes and discourses of governance over time are reciprocally linked in a constellation of state institutions and firms.
Keywords:
Activity based costs,
Competitive analysis,
Manufacturing industries,
Social networks,
World class manufacturing
Article Type:
Research paper
References:
Article URL:
www.emeraldinsight.com/10.1108/18325910810878937