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Professor Jan Bebbington: Extended C.V.

Faculty Title

Professor of Accounting and Sustainable Development
Deputy Head of School
Director, St Andrews Sustainability Institute

Web Links

Centre for Social and Environmental Accounting Research (CSEAR)
St Andrews Sustainability Institute (SASI)

Education

1984-86 Bachelor of Commerce in Accountancy, University of Canterbury, New Zealand
1989-90 Masters of Commerce (Honours) in Accountancy, University of Canterbury, New Zealand
1991-99 PhD in Accountancy, University of Dundee (Title: Accounts of and accounting for sustainable development)
1997 City and Guilds 7037 (Further and Adult Education Teachers' certificate)

Professional Qualifications

1998 Admitted to the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants.

Employment History

1987-89 Accountant, KPMG Peat Marwick, Christchurch, New Zealand. Auditor and tax consultant.
1989-91 Assistant Lecturer, Department of Accountancy, University of Canterbury, New Zealand. Undertook teaching and research while studying part-time for a Master of Commerce degree.
1991-99 Senior lecturer (1997-1999), lecturer (1992-1997) and research fellow (1991-1992), Department of Accountancy and Business Finance, University of Dundee, Scotland.
2000-2004 Professor of Accountancy, Department of Accountancy and Finance, University of Aberdeen, Scotland.
2004 to date Professor of Accountancy and Sustainable Development, School of Management, University of St Andrews, Scotland.

Research

Overview

My research focuses in two areas: considering the issues which the sustainable development agenda brings to bear on organisations and examining how systems of governance affect the achievement of sustainable development. I have conducted a number of longitudinal case studies using participant observation research methodologies and also use interviews and questionnaires to obtain research data. The theoretical themes underpinning my research are: (i) the role of accounting and reporting in organisational change processes, (ii) how accounting operates within regimes of control, (iii) the representational power of accounts of organisational activities and (iv) the evolution of sustainability science and its application to problem arenas.

Research Grants

1992
  • £3,850 from the Certified Association of Chartered Accountants to research business and accountants' conceptions of sustainability (with Ian Thomson, Heriot-Watt University). Publication of research monograph in 1996.
1994
  • US$16,000 from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Centre for Transnational Corporations to investigate European business conceptions of sustainability and implications for accountancy (with Professor Rob Gray, University of Dundee). Publication of research report 1996 and academic paper in 2000.
1997
  • £5,700 from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland to investigate the valuation of assets and liabilities given the impact of the environmental agenda and law. This grant was jointly shared with five colleagues in the Department of Accountancy and Business Finance (University of Dundee), a staff member of the Department of Law (University of Dundee) and a staff member of the Department of Accountancy (Abertay University). Publication of research monograph 1998.
  • £9,000 from the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants to investigate how the accounting profession should respond for calls to develop full cost accounting (with Professor Rob Gray, University of Glasgow and Chris Hibbitt, Limperg Institute, The Netherlands). Report published in 2001.
2000
  • £35,150 from BP to develop a model for accounting for their social impacts. Publications in 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2007.
2001
  • £10,780 from the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants to further evaluate BP's Sustainable Assessment Model. Book published in 2007.
  • £1,500 from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors Foundation to provide a scoping study of how the Sustainability Assessment Model could be applied to property development evaluations. Publication in 2003.
2002
  • NZ$ 9.1 million (approximately £3.2 million) as part of a research team (lead by Landcare Research (New Zealand) Ltd) on the subject of “Sustainable Cities and Settlements” from the New Zealand Foundation for Research in Science and Technology. My role in this project was to contribute research expertise to modelling and accounting for sustainable development impacts. The project ran from 2002 – 2008. Publication in 2007 (two) and 2009 (two).
  • € 60,500 (approximately £44,000) from the Spanish Government as part of a research team (lead by Carlos Larrinaga of the University of Burgos in Spain on the subject of "Full cost accounting – integrating environmental costs in corporate annual reports". This project ran from 2004-2006.
  • £15,000 from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland for a project on ethics and the accounting profession. Research report published 2004.
2003
  • Co-investigator (with colleagues from the Universities of Dundee, Glasgow Caledonian and Loughborough) on EPSRC funded project (number EP/C008030/1) on Metrics, Models and Toolkits for Whole Life Sustainable Urban Development. Total grant value £1,276,306. Project ran from 2004 – 2008. Publications in 2009 (two).
2006
  • €108,000 (approximately £80,000) from the Spanish Government as part of a research team (lead by Carlos Larrinaga of the University of Burgos in Spain) on the issues raised for accounting and reporting by the sustainable development agenda. This project ran from 2007-2010.
2007
  • £2,478 with five colleagues from St Andrews (lead by Rehema White) on a FILTA grant called Crossing the Boundaries: towards interdisciplinary teaching.
  • £4,000 (with Rehema White) from the Higher Education Academy to develop teaching materials for sustainable development educators.
  • £4,535 (with Nick Barter) from the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants to examine barriers to business actions for sustainable development. Publication in 2010.
2009
  • £25,000 (with colleagues at the Macaulay Institute) to review the social science literature as it pertains to climate change and forestry in the UK. Funding was obtained from the Forestry Commission. Publication in 2009.
  • £74,720 (with Rehema White and Steve Reicher, University of St Andrews) on an ESRC/Scottish Government collaborative PhD (1+3) studentship titled "Communities for Climate Change: An Evaluation".
  • £28,650 (with Nick Barter) from the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants for a project titled "adapting to climate change regimes: a survey of accounting practice". Publication in 2011.
2010
  • £19,870 (with Heather Lovell and Carlos Larrinaga-Gonzales) from the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants for a project titled "Accounting for carbon credits". Publication in 2010.
  • £25,000 (with Hamid van Korten and Rehema White) from the Scottish Univerisities Insight Institute for a project titled "Designing the transition to sustainability: resourcing community resilience".
2011
  • £20,833 from the Carnegie UK Trust to develop sustainable development resources and engage users with a report of how we might move beyond GDP as a primary measure of progress.
  • £25,000 (with Lorna Stevenson and Alison Fox) from the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants and Carbon Tracker for a project titled "Global Climate Change and Fossil Fuel Reserves Reporting".

Other awards

1997-2000
  • Awarded an academic fellowship from the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales from 1997-2000. I took the award (£12,000 over 3 years) in the form of funds to support research.

Academic and Professional Activities

Governmental appointments

2006-2011 Vice Chair (Scotland) of the Sustainable Development Commission. This is an advisory Non-Departmental Public Body whose role is to promote sustainable development across the UK and all sectors of society, particularly within government. Appointment to this committee was by way of competitive interview.
2002-2007 Member of the Scottish Executive Cabinet Sub-Committee on Sustainable Scotland (chaired by the Scottish First Minister). This committee was charged with responsibility for embedding sustainable development within the Scottish Executive’s operations. Appointment to this committee was by way of a competitive interview.

Both of these roles involved extensive engagement with public policy processes as well as substantive contributions to policy documents. Processes and publications with which I had extensive and close involvement are:

  1. As a member of the Scottish Executive Cabinet Sub-Committee on Sustainable Scotland reviewed and guided the publication in 2005 of Choosing Our Future: Scotland’s Sustainable Development Strategy. As a member of this group I also participated in the development of an indicator set (and the structures of accountability around this indicator set) that would support evaluation of the delivery of the Strategy. With the development of a National Performance Framework by the SNP minority Government (2007-2011) this indicator set was shelved.
  2. As a member of the Scottish Executive Cabinet Sub-Committee on Sustainable Scotland reviewed and guided the publication in 2006 of Learning for our future: Scotland’s first action plan for the UN decade of education for sustainable development. As the first half of the UN Decade came to a close I chaired (on behalf of the Scottish Government and in my role of Vice-Chair of the Sustainable Development Commission) a stakeholder group that supported the Government’s development of its plans for supporting the second half of the UN Decade.
  3. As I Vice-Chair of the Sustainable Development Commission contributed to the reviews of Government performance against sustainable development criteria in 2007; 2008; 2009 and 2010. This work formed part of the bedrock from which accountability between Government and its stakeholders was achieved. This work was also extensively used by relevant Parliamentary committees and external stakeholders (such as academics) as well as forming the basis for engagement with relevant Ministers and civil servants.
  4. As Vice-Chair of the Sustainable Development Commission I was involved in the shaping of waste policy and in particular to the development of a zero waste vision and strategy for Scotland. There were two key inputs to this process. First, the Sustainable Development Commission published a report in 2007 titled A Burning Issue: energy from waste in Scotland that informed Government policy in this area. Second, from 2007 until 2008 I was a member of the Zero Waste Think Tank (in a personal capacity) which led to the development of the Zero Waste Strategy for Scotland. This is an example of policy work leading to policy formulation and concrete actions on the ground.
  5. As Vice-Chair of the Sustainable Development Commission I was a member (during 2008 and 2009) of the Food and Drink Leadership Forum. This was a body convened by the Scottish Government to create a national Food and Drink Policy: published in 2009 as Recipe for Success: Scotland’s National Food and Drink Policy. In addition, the ‘champions’ for each area of relevance (health, environment, economy and affordability) published their own recommendations for how a food and drink policy would be fit for purpose in the face of various interlocking sustainable development challenges. The report (Leadership Forum Report: Development of the National Food and Drink Policy) was published in 2009 by the Scottish Government. I played a key role in conceptualising and writing the Leadership Forum report.
  6. The final project that I was closely involved in was chairing a Round Table (with sponsorship and the support of the Carnegie UK Trust) to consider how Scotland might respond to the findings of the Commission on the Measurement of Economic Progress and Social Progress (see www.stiglitz-sen-fitoussi.fr/en/index.htm). The Round Table report was published in 2011 and was aimed at informing the Scottish Government’s National Performance Framework.

International appointments

Since 1997 Honorary Fellow of the Cento de Investigacion en Contabilidad Social y Medioambiental (Centre for the investigation of social and environmental accounting) at Universidad Pablo de Olavide, Spain. I have attended their bi-annual research symposiums between 1997 and 2007.
Since 2002 International advisory member of the Spanish professional accounting body (their equivalent of the Institute of Chartered Accountants) who have a standing committee to address the accountants' role in supporting corporate social reporting.
Since 2003 Research Associate of Landcare Research (New Zealand) Ltd.
Since 2011 Member of Landcare Research (New Zealand) Ltd’s Strategic Science Advisory Panel.

National appointments

Since 2000 Associate Director of the Centre for Social and Environmental Accounting Research (CSEAR). I have been affiliated with CSEAR since its inception in 1991 at the University of Dundee.
1999 - 2005 Short-listing judge for the Association of Certified Chartered Accountants sustainable development reporting award scheme (formally the environmental reporting award scheme).
2006 - 2010 Chair of the Association of Certified Chartered Accountants' Social and Environmental Accounting Committee. I was been a member of this committee from 1999.

Editorships, editorial boards and refereeing

2008-2011 Co-editor of the Social and Environmental Accountability Journal, which is the society journal of the Centre for Social and Environmental Accounting Research. From 2008 the journal moved from being non-refereed to being pre-dominantly refereed. In addition, in 2011 the journal moved to its first external publisher - Routledge.
Since 2001 Member of the editorial board of The Journal of Applied Accounting Research.
Since 2009 Member of the Editorial board of Revista de Contabilidad (the Spanish Accounting Review).
Since 2009 Associate editor of Accounting Forum.
Since 2010 Associate editor of Accounting, Auditing and Accountability Journal.

I have also edited/co-edited special issues of European Accounting Review on environmental and social accounting (2000) and on the accounting implications of carbon markets (2008); Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy journal on risk governance (2006); Public Money and Management on sustainable development and the public sector (2008); and Accounting Forum on performance measurement for sustainable development (2009).

I have three special issue editorships in play currently: one with Management Accounting Research on sustainable development due to be published in 2012; one with Social and Environmental Accountability Journal on engagement with policy processes due to be published in 2013; and one with Accounting, Auditing and Accountability Journal on sustainable development initiatives in higher education contexts due to be published in 2014.

An ad hoc referee for Accounting, Accountability and Performance; Accounting Education: An International Journal; Australian Accounting Review; Accounting, Organizations and Society; British Accounting Review; Chartered Institute of Management Accountants; Critical Perspectives on Accounting; Ecological Economics; the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC); European Accounting Review, Financial Accountability, Management; Management Accounting Research and Journal of Business Ethics.

Visiting posts

2001 Visiting Professor at the University of Burgos, Spain.
2003 Visiting Professor at the University of Zaragoza, Spain.
2004 Visiting Professor at Macquarie University, Sydney Australia.
2006 Visiting Professor at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand.
2003-2006 Visiting Professor at the University of Northumbria in the Newcastle Business School.
2010 to date Visiting Professor at the University of Newcastle.

Industry engagement

From 2008-2012 I was a member of FirstGroup’s external corporate social responsibility advisory committee.

Teaching and Administrative Duties

I have undertaken a full spectrum of administrative duties related to teaching and research as well as University level administration roles during my time in academia.

University of St Andrews Teaching Duties

Current teaching (2011-2012)

  • Co-ordinate and teach on MN5001 (Contemporary Global Issues in Management) – a core degree module in our M.Litt programme.
  • Contribute teaching to the First year core management module MN1001 (Organisations and Society).
  • Contribute to SD5002 (Knowledge and Sustainable Development) module on the post graduate MSc in Sustainable Development degree.

Current Administrative Duties

School

  • Co-Head of School, School of Management (2011 to date). In 2010 I served as Deputy Head of School. This is a senior academic post where I have responsibility for the smooth operation of a school of approximately 34 staff and a turnover of £7 million. I deal with all aspects of human resources, finance and operational matters as well as providing intellectual leadership along with other professorial colleagues.

University

  • Director of the St Andrews Sustainability Institute. This is an interdisciplinary institute focusing on facilitating research and post-graduate education in sustainable development.
  • Chair of the Sustainable Development Management Committee that considers strategic issues for teaching and research of sustainable development at the University of St. Andrews.
  • Member of the University Sustainable Development Committee which has responsibility for ensuring that sustainable development is fully integrated into our teaching, research and estates activities.
  • Short listing Judge of the St Andrews Prize for the Environment (see www.thestandrewsprize.com/) (2004 – 2007 and 2009 onwards).

Past administration (School and University)

  • Director of Teaching for the School of Management and member of the School Management Committee (2004 - 2006).
  • Member of a gender equality review team (2004-2005).
  • Member of the appointing committee for the new principal of St Andrews University (2008).
  • Programme co-ordinator for the post graduate Sustainable Development degree (2010-11 and 2011-12). I also played a key role in developing the programme.

Other related responsibilities

External examiner at the University of Napier (1998-2000), the University of Glasgow (2000-2003), the University of Strathclyde (2002-2005), Keele University (2003-2007), University of York (2004-2008) and the University of Edinburgh (2008- to date).

PhD examiner for the University of Wollongong, Australia (2000), University of Aberdeen (2001, 2002, 2010), University of Adelaide, Australia (2002, 2006), Dundee University (2005), University of Glasgow (2006), University of Amsterdam (2010), University of Auckland (2011) and University of London: Royal Holloway (2011).

Research Students

Current PhD students

  1. Svenja Merricks – Communities for climate change: an evaluation. This is an ESRC/Scottish Government funded studentship.
  2. Alex Gnanapragasam – Assessing the effectiveness of outdoor education to deliver transformative learning for sustainability.
  3. Pei-Shan Yu – Understanding and evaluating carbon markets.
  4. Rod Bain – Role of community woodlands and woodland craft practices in creating resilience.

Completed PhD students

  1. Radhi Al-Hamadeen (2007). Assurance of Corporate Stand-alone Reporting: Evidence from the UK.
  2. Thereza Raquel Sales de Aguiar (2009). Corporate disclosure of greenhouse gas emissions: A UK study.
  3. Jane Gibbon (2009). Enacting social accounting with a community enterprise: actualising hermeneutic conversation.
  4. Michael Fraser (2010). Social accounting technologies and organisational change: An exploration of the sustainability assessment model.
  5. Nick Barter (2011). Pursuing sustainability: An exploratory study of organisations that have environmental missions.

Jan Bebbington - Publications (PDF, 48 KB)

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