Cultural Circularities that Limit Diversity: Emancipating Voices

This commentary was prompted by a call to consider how our research can give voice to the managed diversity in accounting and contribute to more emancipatory outcomes. Despite numerous developments and initiatives in the name of EDI in accounting, inequalities persist. Reflecting on both our own prior research and a longstanding body of work in this field, we highlight how socialisation processes, discourses and language, spatial management of diversity and prevailing understandings of merit subtly operate together to create a complex set of loops that stymie diversity and inclusion efforts. These loops result in referencing new ideas or practices around diversity and inclusion, back to dominant and exclusionary beliefs about how work and individuals are valued. We contend that the management of diversity, and socialisation processes reinforce individualising ideas of self-worth and identity, and this can cause anxiety about voicing difference and diverse individuals may instead internalise a pressure to fit in.