How Auditors Legitimize Commercialism: A Micro-Discursive Analysis

58 Pages Posted: 28 Aug 2020 Last revised: 12 May 2023

See all articles by Simon Dermarkar

Simon Dermarkar

HEC Montreal

Mouna Hazgui

HEC Montreal - Department of Accounting Studies

Date Written: July 1, 2020

Abstract

This study draws on Berger and Luckmann’s (1966) social constructivism and on Van Leeuwen’s (2007) work on the discursive forms of legitimization to examine how individual auditors explain and justify the prevalence of commercialism in their audit firms and profession. The literature on commercialism in auditing addresses the question of how it has been institutionalized and legitimized at the macro-level of the accounting field (e.g., Cooper & Robson, 2006; Guo, 2016; Malsch & Gendron, 2013; Suddaby et al., 2007). However, this literature does not explore the micro-level processes through which auditors justify their own commercialism. Thus, it overlooks the central role that individual subjectivity and interpretation play in the maintenance and transmission of institutional logics (Bévort & Suddaby, 2016; Thornton & Ocasio, 2008). In our view, this has prevented accounting scholars from developing a more meaningful conceptualization of the relationship between auditors’ commercialism and their professionalism, one that goes beyond the apparently clashing imperatives of these two logics. The findings of our study suggest that the positive values auditors attribute to the logic of commercialism blur the distinction between their commercial and their professional commitments, so that the notion of a fundamental conflict between their commercialism and their public interest mission comes to be seen as almost absurd. Overall, our analysis of the ways that professionalism and commercialism intertwine with each other in auditors’ daily lives suggests that the relationship between these two logics is much more complex than previously assumed.

Keywords: Commercialism; Accounting Profession; Discursive Legitimization; Social Constructivism

Suggested Citation

Dermarkar, Simon and Hazgui, Mouna, How Auditors Legitimize Commercialism: A Micro-Discursive Analysis (July 1, 2020). Critical Perspectives on Accounting Available online 14 August 2020, 102228 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cpa.2020.102228, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3657264 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3657264

Simon Dermarkar

HEC Montreal ( email )

3000, Chemin de la Côte-Sainte-Catherine
Montreal, Quebec H2X 2L3
Canada

Mouna Hazgui (Contact Author)

HEC Montreal - Department of Accounting Studies ( email )

3000, Chemin de la Côte-Sainte-Catherine
Montreal H3T 2A7, Quebec
Canada

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