No such thing as … the “language” of business II

Abstract

A nostrum of business is that accounting can be read as the language of business. However, for very good reasons the claims for it as such are weak, and whilst a strong case can be brought for its inability to provide a genuine and useful “audit” of the firm’s essence, the question that begs addressing is; “How, despite such a case, this nostrum prevails?” The answer this paper forwards lies in the metaphorical nature of any language, together with a path‐dependency in the selection of ideas, metaphors, analogies…. Although, one has to hope at the end the nostrum is defeated.

Citation

Williams, R. (1998), "No such thing as … the “language” of business II", Management Decision, Vol. 36 No. 3, pp. 198-203. https://doi.org/10.1108/00251749810208995