Abstract

Accounting scholars are paying increasing attention to the notion of commensuration, or the translation of different objects into common metrics that make the entities that are subject to performance evaluation comparable, and the effects this has on organizational behavior. This body of research draws attention to organizations’ commensuration work, defined as the efforts that evaluated organizations expend in pursuing and dealing with resistance to commensuration, but has mainly explored how such work emerges in response to a single set of comparable metrics such as individual rankings or ratings. By contrast, we ask how commensuration work unfolds in relation to a broader assemblage of calculative infrastructures. Such infrastructures can entail multiple, inter-related performance evaluation procedures that influence organizations’ commensuration work and give rise to complex patterns of reactivity, denoting the propensity of organizations to alter their behavior as they internalize external pressures for performance evaluation. Our empirical findings underline the importance of adopting a multi-layered view of commensuration work, that entails both direct and indirect forms of reactivity, as it unfolds in relation to a broader assemblage of calculative infrastructures. We discuss the implications of adopting such a view for future research on commensuration and related research on performance evaluation.

Introduction

Accounting scholars have long taken a keen interest in the regulatory standards that govern the development of organizational accounting practices as they evolve as an integral part of broader, societal reform programs (Miller, 1991; Modell, 2014). A particular type of standardization that is gaining increasing recognition in this body of scholarship is that concerned with the notion of commensuration, or the translation of different objects into common metrics that make the entities that are subject to performance evaluation comparable (Espeland & Stevens, 1998, 2008). Accounting research exploring this phenomenon has mainly evolved along two trajectories. The first stream of research has focused on how mechanisms of commensuration, such as the categorization of qualitative phenomena into comparable metrics, come into being and govern broader populations of organizations (e.g., Crvelin & Löhlein, 2022; Mehrpouya & Samiolo, 2016; Pollock & D’Adderio, 2012; Unerman et al., 2018). The second and more substantial body of research examines how evaluated organizations respond to such mechanisms (e.g., Englund & Gerdin, 2020; Gerdin & Englund, 2019; Kolk et al., 2008; Kornberger & Carter, 2010; Llewellyn & Northcott, 2005; Scott & Orlikowski, 2012). Much of this research documents how such responses are underpinned by strong tendencies toward reactivity, or the propensity of organizations to alter their behavior as they internalize external pressures for performance evaluation (Espeland & Sauder, 2007, 2016), but also draws attention to how such reactive tendencies may be contested by actors who resist or strive to transform the mechanisms through which commensuration is brought about (e.g., Englund & Gerdin, 2020; Gerdin & Englund, 2019; Mennicken, 2013; Pollock et al., 2018; Samiolo, 2012).

Concluding Discussion

In this paper, we have asked how organizations’ commensuration work unfolds where a broader assemblage of calculative infrastructures underpins societal reform programs. We have addressed this research question in the context of Swedish central government during a period when a societal reform program aimed at enhancing the autonomy of government agencies while increasing their accountability for results was amplified by an attempt to radically increase their reporting discretion. In doing so, we have nuanced the view that the pursuit of commensuration by evaluated organizations manifests itself as a reactive response to a single, externally sanctioned set of clearly identifiable and comparable metrics which has dominated prior research on the topic (Pollock et al., 2018; Slager & Gond, 2022). Instead, what is emerging from our empirical analysis is a multi-layered view of commensuration work that recognizes that direct, reactive responses can interact with more indirect forms of reactivity that can be traced back to a broader assemblage of calculative infrastructures. In the SEA, the inter-related infrastructures provided by the NAO and the Financial Management Evaluations clearly reinforced the commensuration work unfolding within the agency and contributed to stabilizing the emerging performance reporting practices even though they were not the direct progenitors of these practices. Hence, calculative infrastructures can buttress organizations’ commensuration work and reinforce tendencies toward reactivity even though they are somewhat removed from the accounting practices that are subject to such work. As we have also seen, this entails a reciprocal relationship between commensuration and reactivity where reactive responses do not follow from a set of readily available, commensurable metrics but rather evolve as such metrics get connected to a broader assemblage of calculative infrastructures and lead to further commensuration work.