Coming out into Earth accounting politics

Environmental accounting has become steadily more involved in wider struggles over the articulation of planetary existence. We wish to draw attention to previously muted opportunities for critical engagement in environmental accounting scholarship which this coming out into what we call Earth accounting politics is offering. We argue that alliances between environmental accounting, scientific authority, and environmental activism that have allowed the field to grow over its first few decades have hampered the interrogation of the knowledge and politics involved. With deeper involvement in Earth accounting politics alongside wider recognition of diverse environmental accountings, the articulation of environmental matters of concern is becoming more contestable, and its idiosyncratic and often personal character is becoming increasingly apparent. In this new context, environmental accounting can realise itself as an accounting practice grounded in a care for planetary matters of concern which is personal, ethical, and political all the same. In finding support for their articulations, Earth accountants reach out across the spectrum of knowledge – from the scientific to the indigenous, spiritual to the profane - and across the political spectrum, from left to right, liberal to libertarian. The more environmental accountants are coming out into Earth accounting politics, the less likely they are to remain scientifically faithful or politically correct in their efforts to make resonate what they care about.