No abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic and associated response have brought food security into sharp focus for many New Zealanders. The requirement to “shelter in place” for eight weeks nationwide, with only “essential services” operating, affected all parts of the New Zealand food system. The nationwide full lockdown highlighted existing inequities and created new challenges to food access, availability, affordability, distribution, transportation, and waste management. While Aotearoa New Zealand is a food producer, there remains uncertainty surrounding the future of local food systems, particularly as the long-term effects of the pandemic emerge. In this article we draw on interviews with food rescue groups, urban farms, community organisations, supermarket management, and local and central government staff to highlight the diverse, rapid, community-based responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. Our findings reveal shifts at both the local scale, where existing relationships and short supply chains have been leveraged quickly, and national scale, where funding has been mobilised towards a different food strategy. We use these findings to re-imagine where and how responsibility might be taken up differently to enhance resilience and care in diverse food systems in New Zealand.

PurposeThe study uses the case of an online-mediated barter economy that proliferated during the COVID-19 crisis to highlight Indigenous notions of barter, trade and exchange.Design/methodology/approachA netnographic approach was employed which involved collecting online posts and comments which were stored and analysed in NVivo. This was supplemented with field notes and reflections from authors with an intimate knowledge of the context. These were analysed thematically. The overall methodology is inspired by decolonising methodologies that seek to restore the agency of Indigenous Peoples in research towards self-determination.FindingsFindings suggest that during and beyond the crisis, social media (a new means) is being used to facilitate barter and determinations of/accounting for value within. This is being done through constant appeals to, and adaptation of, tradition (old ways). Indigenous accounting is therefore best understood as so through Indigenous accountability values and practices.Originality/valueThis paper propose a re-orientation of accounting for barter research that incorporates recent debates between the disciplines of economics and anthropology on the nature of barter, debt and exchange. The authors also propose a re-imagining of accounting and accountability relations based on Indigenous values within an emerging online barter system in Fiji during COVID-19 as “old ways and new means” to privilege Indigenous agency and overcome excessive essentialism.

PurposeThis paper explores diverse practices of the giving and demanding of democratic accountability within a case of conflict around deep-sea petroleum exploration in Aotearoa New Zealand. These practices include submissions and consultations, partnership between Indigenous Peoples and a settler-colonial government and dissensus. These are theorised through the political thought of Jacques Rancière.Design/methodology/approachA single case study approach is employed that seeks to particularise and draws on interview, documentary and media materials.FindingsBy examining a case of conflict, the authors find that as opportunities for participation in democratic accountability processes are eroded, political dissensus emerges to demand parts in the accountability process. Dissensus creates counter forums within a wider understanding of democratic accountability. In this case, individuals and organisations move between police (where hierarchy counts those with a part) and politics (exercised when this hierarchy is disrupted by dissensus) to demand parts as police logics become more and less democratic. These parts are then utilised towards particular interests, but in this case to also create additional parts for those with none.Originality/valueThis study privileges demands for accountability through dissensus as fundamental to democratic accountability, rather than just account giving and receiving. That is, who is or who is not included – who has a stake or a part – is crucial in a broader understanding of democratic accountability. This provides democratic accountability with a radical potential for creating change. The study also advances thinking on democratic accountability by drawing from Indigenous perspectives and experiences in a settler-colonial context.

PurposeThis study explores accounting practice in an Indigenous organization. This organization is embedded within a rural Aboriginal community in the country currently known as Australia. In doing so, this study illustrates the intertwining of accounting practice, practitioners, organizations and social/cultural context, while recognizing that the cultural embeddedness of accounting is not uniform.Design/methodology/approachEmpirical materials were collected as part of a qualitative field study with an Indigenous organization. Specific methods include interviews, informal conversations, documentary reviews and participant observations. These materials were analysed through a Bourdieusian perspective.FindingsBy working with Indigenous Peoples on the ground, rather than relying on secondary materials, this study highlights how the values of a community challenge and reorient accounting practice towards community aspirations. This study illustrates how fields beyond the organization influence accounting practice, including in budgeting and assurance.Originality/valueExploring Indigenous practices of accounting maintains Indigenous agency and opens up space for alternative understandings and practices of accounting. By illustrating how a community can influence the accounting practice of an organization, this study has implications for wider understandings of the cultural embeddedness of mainstream accounting and possible alternatives.