Abstract

QUINTERO CARDONA, Aura Cristina. ACCOUNTING AS A GOVERNMENT PRACTICE. A READING OF THE INTERVENTION OF ACCOUNTING IN THE SUBJECTIVATION PROCESSES OF THE EMPLOYEES AT A BANK IN COLOMBIA. Innovar [online]. 2021, vol.31, n.82, pp.25-43.  Epub Nov 11, 2021. ISSN 0121-5051.  https://doi.org/10.15446/innovar.v31n82.98420.

This work attempts to understand the ways in which accounting performs governance practices on the employees of a bank in Colombia. The research starts from a heterodox view that tries to contribute to the understanding of accounting in its social and organizational contexts. Particularly, grounded in neoliberal governmentality insights, this work opens the possibility of reading accounting as a government practice that affects subjectivation processes at work, given its intervention as a program and as a technology. Under a qualitative approach and deploying the case study as a strategy, the methodological design of the research consists of documentary (annual management and social responsibility reports) and oral sources of information (semi-structured interviews with employees), which were examined through qualitative content analysis. From there, four styles of accounting governance, expressed through a Variable Compensation Program (VCP), were identified and studied. Findings show that the exercise of accounting through the measurement, evaluation and control processes carried out within the framework of the VCP participates in the subjectivation processes of employees, thus encouraging subjects to act freely, but in accordance with specific organizational objectives.

Keywords : accounting; bank; government; governmentality; neoliberalism; subjectivation practices.

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