Dorothea Dix: A social researcher and reformer

Dorothea Lynde Dix (1802 – 1887) was a passionate and pioneering nineteenth century mental health reformer. Bound by the conventions and proprieties of her time, she was nevertheless a ground breaking advocate of people with mental illness. Her methods of research, lobbying and advocacy were both innovative and effective. This paper traces Dorothea Lynde Dix’s researches in Massachusetts from 1841 until 1848. Her methods of research and lobbying are illustrated in the context of social and legal conventions that did not allow women to directly address the state legislatures of the time. The detractors of “Dragon Dix” are examined. Her successes are also celebrated in this paper

The influence of Jeremy Bentham on recent Public Sector Financial Reforms

Jeremy Bentham’s (1748 – 1832) work while vast is generally considered to be based primarily on economics, law, social control, public administration and public interest. His most notable contributions are in the areas of utilitarianism, a moral theory where the correct action is one which produces the greatest amount of happiness or least amount of pain for the greatest number of people, and the use of a system of constant surveillance, panopticon, to internalise the desired behaviour of individuals. Bentham also made significant contributions to public sector financial accountability through his work on the principle of publicity where he outlined the need for “the doors of all public establishments … to be, thrown wide open to the body of the curious at large” (Bentham cited in Bowring 1843, p. 46). The purpose of this paper is to identify and examine the similarities of Bentham’s work and the New Public Management practices currently influencing public sector financial reforms. The theoretical framework of this paper is shaped through a reflection of Bentham’s work on utilitarianism, public administration, bookkeeping and publicity (reporting) and a review of the rationale behind the relatively recent New Public Management ideology which has driven many of the recent public sector financial reforms. The paper argues that many of today’s public sector financial accountability processes and procedures associated with recent public sector financial reforms, which are based on New Public Management, reflect much of Bentham’s work. For example the preparation of publicly available budget reports such as Portfolio Budget Statements, which contain the proposed annual expenditure of government departments and are used to assist in the discharge of public sector organisations’ financial accountability, could be linked to Bentham’s principle of publicity. The key finding of this paper is that research based on Bentham’s work will improve the understanding of the recent New Public Management based public sector financial reforms

Pound foolish - accounting\u27s role in deinstitutionalisation

This thesis set out to examine two accounting questions. The first one was whether accounting had played a role in encouraging the shifting of costs between the government (particularly the State Government of New South Wales) and the following groups of people: People with mental illness Carers of people with mental illness Government institutions for health, jails, welfare and housing Non-government charitable institutions The answer to this question was found to be that accounting had indeed played a role in the shifting of costs in this area. It had also played a role in making certain costs appear to be real and in causing other costs to disappear from view. The Monetary and Entity assumptions of accounting are particularly relevant here. The second question explored in this thesis was, could accounting be used (acknowledging difficulties with quantification and identification of costs) as an analysis tool in the context of mental health in examining the issue of whether deinstitutionalisation from mental hospitals actually reduced costs. Or did it merely shift costs from one budget (government) to a wider budget (society)? The answer to this question was less clear cut. From a societal perspective, it seems that the costs of deciding to deinstitutionalise people from mental hospitals in the irresponsible and heartless way that it was done in New South Wales imposed vast and unfair burdens on the classes of people enumerated above. Whether the societal costs are the correct ones to be considered was found to be open to debate as was the potential usefulness of accounting in answering such questions. Rationalist motivations were found to be overwhelmingly dominant when it came to the decision to pursue deinstitutionalisation as little more than dumping; but the rhetoric to go with the decisions was glibly humanitarian. From a narrow, accounting perspective, deinstitutionalisation was pursued in a very satisfactory manner. From the perspective of those most affected by the policy, and from an ethical viewpoint, deinstitutionalisation is argued to have had disastrous consequences for some of its consumers and to have been immoral. What are the consequences of this sort of public policy analysis? In the case of welfare providing social harmony through encouraging the people\u27s allegiance to the state, the niggardly treatment of people with mental illness is perhaps a cause for concern. True, people with mental illness and their carers are a wise choice as targets for bad treatment - being amongst the most voiceless and powerless members of the community. Where the state is endangering the social harmony aspect of welfare is that the penny wise, pound foolish treatment of people with mental illness seems to extend to a broader realm of government policy than just deinstitutionalisation. Society in general may risk alienation and unrest if the sort of narrow, unethical, accounting-based, economic rationalist decision making, so evident in deinstitutionalisation, spreads widely throughout areas of public policy

Dorothea Dix: A social researcher and reformer

Dorothea Lynde Dix (1802 – 1887) was a passionate and pioneering nineteenth century mental health reformer. Bound by the conventions and proprieties of her time, she was nevertheless a ground breaking advocate of people with mental illness. Her methods of research, lobbying and advocacy were both innovative and effective. This paper traces Dorothea Lynde Dix’s researches in Massachusetts from 1841 until 1848. Her methods of research and lobbying are illustrated in the context of social and legal conventions that did not allow women to directly address the state legislatures of the time. The detractors of “Dragon Dix” are examined. Her successes are also celebrated in this paper

Costing Schizophrenia

This article looks at a particular subset of mental illness in Australia: schizophrenia, and reflects on how the direct costs that fall within the parametres of the health budget are privileged (inscribed), compared to how indirect costs that fall outside this boundary fail to be inscribed appropriately. This article concludes that, from a social accounting point of view, this boundary is arbitrary and an example of poor accounting

Editorial Volume 5 Issue 4

Welcome to the final issue of AABFJ for 2011. The journal has grown in the past year with an increase in submissions and the editors are considering strategies to manage future publications

Editorial Volume 5, Issue 1

This issue of AABFJ is the first in our fifth year of publication and in recognition we present papers covering the areas of finance, economics-related finance, banking and accounting. In this new research environment of ERA rankings, the ability to publish across all these fields is an important contribution. The finance paper (Lepone & Mistry 2011) examines the question of whether placing disclosed (broker placing order is identified) versus undisclosed (no broker identifier given) limit orders affects price movements on the Australian Securities Exchange. This study uses miro-trading data from SIRCA (Security Industry Research Centre of Asia-Pacific) to provide insights for both academics, regulators and practitioners

Rationalism\u27s irrationality - an example from Australian mental health policy

This article reflects on the way in which accounting-related thinking influenced one particular historical event: the process of deinstitutionalisation from mental hospitals in New South Wales. The article suggests that accounting (via economic rationalism and other allied philosophical lenses ) led to the under funding of the deinstitutionalisation process to the detriment of society as a whole. Some of the societal difficulties inherent in using such rationalist calculus (biased towards quantified, monetary, accounting entity assumptions) as a means of evaluating social policies are then considered

Accounting and Asylums: A case study reflecting on the role of accounting related thinking in deinstitutionalisation policy in New South Wales

ABSTRACT This case study reflects on the way in which accounting-related thinking informed the process of deinstitutionalisation from mental hospitals in New South Wales. A test to establish dominant motivations in changes in social policy (developed by sociologist Andrew Scull (1984) in his study of deinstitutionalisation in England and the United States of America) is explained and applied to the outcomes of deinstitutionalisation in New South Wales. This test is applied using a policy evaluation model adapted from Puckett (1993). This case study concludes that the dominant force motivating the way in which deinstitutionalisation policy was implemented in New South Wales drew largely on economic rationalist calculus. Some of the societal difficulties inherent in using such rationalist calculus (biased towards quantified, monetary, accounting entity assumptions) as a means of evaluating social policies are then considere

Editorial Volume 8, Issue 2

Editorial AABFJ Volume 8, Issue