INTERPRETIVE AND CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING 57
The organization as a
CLOSED SYSTEM
protected from its environment
by a protective boundary
RATIONAL perspective:
goal-oriented collective
with formal structure
NATURAL perspective:
motivated by self-interest,
informal relations more
important than formal
ones
Theories such as:
Scientific management (Taylor) Theories such as:
Bureaucracy (Weber)
Shareholder value (see Chapter 2)
Human relations (Mayo)
AGIL (Parsons)
The organization as an
OPEN SYSTEM
with activities that are loosely
coupled to satisfy both the demands
of the environment and technical
work activity
OPEN SYSTEMS perspective:
impact of environment on organization
in which the organization is
a shifting coalition of participants
Theories such as:
Contingency theory
Population ecology
Resource dependence
Institutional
Figure 5.1 Organizations as closed or open systems: rational, natural and open systems
perspectives
Based on Scott (1998).
accounting. The appropriate systems emerge from the influence of the environ-
ment (which may be turbulent or static), technology, organizational size and need
to fit with the organizational strategy, structure and culture.Population ecology
theoryis based on the biological analogy of natural selection and holds that