Program - 25th Anniversary A-CSEAR Conference and Early Scholars’ Colloquium 2026

Please see find below information about the scheduled plenary and panel sessions. The program for the Eary Scholars’ Colloquium and Main Conference will be made available once notifications of acceptance have been sent out.

Accounting for Sustainability in Times of Polycrisis: Tracing Impacts Across Global Supply Chains

Professor Arunima Malik | The University of Sydney

Arunima Malik is a Professor of Sustainability and Interdisciplinary Research in the School of Accounting, Governance and Regulation, Business School, and the School of Physics, Faculty of Science. She is the Lead of the Sustainable Business Hub. Her research focuses on sustainability assessment of supply chains at multiple scales, encompassing both local and global perspectives. Arunima’s interdisciplinary work bridges science and business, with an emphasis on assessing the sustainability performance of organisations, industries and nations. Her research contributes to global frameworks such as the Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development and has resulted in policy briefs developed in collaboration with the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network. She has also served as a lead author for Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Assessment Reports and the Lancet Commission on Green Recovery.

In her plenary, Arunima will discuss how global supply chains are complex and interconnected, with international trade contributing to environmental, social, and economic impacts that often remain unaccounted for. Production and consumption systems in one part of the world can shape environmental pressures, resource use, and social outcomes elsewhere, creating significant challenges for understanding progress towards the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Accounting and sustainability assessment models can play a critical role in making these interconnected impacts visible, tracing them across global supply chains, and revealing trade-offs and opportunities for action. This presentation explores how accounting can support a more comprehensive understanding of sustainability progress and contribute to pathways towards sustainable and equitable futures.

The crisis of university governance

Associate Professor Damien Cahill | The University of Sydney

Damien Cahill is General Secretary of the National Tertiary Education Union. After 8 years as a full-time elected trade union leader, he will return to the University of Sydney in October 2026 where he is an Associate Professor in Political Economy. Damien is an internationally recognised scholar who has published extensively on neoliberalism as well as on the social foundations of capitalist economic processes.

In his plenary, Damien will discuss how neoliberal forms of crisis management are now provoking counter-movements, across the political spectrum. The neoliberalisation of university education has occurred on multiple fronts. On the one hand, university funding has become marketized, with revenue sources shifting significantly from public to private sources. At the same time, modes of governance have become more corporatised. This paper will examine the crisis of university governance, its sources, the drivers of neoliberalisation, the nature of the counter-movement, and their relationships to the global polycrisis

Academic Futures in an Age of Polycrisis

Professor Corinne Cortese | University of Wollongong

Corinne is a Professor of Accounting and the Deputy Dean of Graduate Research at the Faculty of Arts, Society & Business at the University of Wollongong, Australia. Her research focuses on regulatory processes, with applications in public sector governance, corporate governance, accounting standard setting, and social and environmental issues. She has published in leading international journals including Critical Perspectives on Accounting; Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal; Corporate Governance: An International Review; Accounting & Finance; Australian Journal of Management; and Accounting History. Corinne completed a Bachelor of Commerce with First Class Honours at Macquarie University, where she also commenced her academic career. She subsequently undertook doctoral studies at the University of Wollongong, earning her PhD in 2006 with the support of an Australian Government scholarship. Following completion of her doctorate, she joined academic staff at UOW. Since 2011, she has held a range of graduate research leadership roles and has been a strong advocate for research candidates and early career researchers. She is committed to fostering environments in which research students can thrive, develop confidence as scholars, and build meaningful careers.

The concept of polycrisis has emerged as a powerful way of understanding a world shaped by intersecting and mutually reinforcing challenges. For PhD candidates and early career researchers, these challenges are especially acute. Emerging scholars are expected to produce high-quality research while navigating uncertain labour markets, rapid technological change, growing demands for interdisciplinarity, and evolving expectations of academic work. The implications are both profound and personal.

In this keynote, Professor Corinne Cortese explores what it means to develop a research career in an age of polycrisis. Drawing on her experience in university leadership, graduate research governance, and a scholarly career focused on regulation, accountability, and institutional change, she reflects on how universities are responding to increasingly complex and often competing demands. The presentation considers how these pressures are reshaping doctoral education, research careers, and the skills and capabilities expected of the next generation of scholars.

At the same time, polycrisis should not be understood solely as a narrative of constraint. Periods of disruption can also create opportunities for innovation, collaboration, and intellectual leadership. For PhD candidates and early career researchers, this raises important questions about purpose, resilience, adaptability, and scholarly identity. Rather than simply navigating complexity, how might emerging scholars help shape the future of universities, research, and the communities they serve? This keynote invites participants to consider the possibilities as well as the challenges of academic futures in uncertain times.

Political economy and contemporary crises

Dr Dale Tweedie | Macquirie University
Professor Elizabeth Hill | The University of Sydney
Associate Professor Ben Spies-Butcher | Macquirie University
Dr Claire Parfitt | The University of Sydney

One characteristic feature of social and environmental accounting is to frame accounting and accountability as inherently political, in a dual sense of acting on socio-political problems and, properly (re)conceived, as shared practices to improve a common life-world. In this panel, we draw on the (inter)disciplinary knowledge of political economy to explore three contemporary crises in which the politics of accounting and accountability practices are implicated: (i) the climate crisis, (ii) the crisis in care; and (iii) the progressive loss of trust in government actors and institutions. In conversation with Prof. Liz Hill, Dr Claire Parfitt, and A/Prof. Ben Spies-Butcher, we will explore ways each crisis intersects with accounting, with accountability, and with each other. We will begin by unpacking core features and dynamics of each crisis, and consider in what ways accounting and accountability is implicated. We will then discuss what potential, if any, new accounting(s) offer to contest or ameliorate each crisis. Finally, we will consider what role(s) accounting scholars might play to addressing these crises, including through research, interdisciplinary collaboration and in wider public-political action.

Critical perspectives on China

Dr Eagle Zhang | The University of Sydney
Dr Lina Xu | RMIT University
Dr Reaven Yu | The University of Sydney
Dr Zhiyuan (Simon) Tan | The University of Sydney

No jurisdiction can be immunised from the interconnected economic, environmental, geopolitical, and social disruptions that constitute today’s polycrisis. Understanding the roles of accounting and accountability under these conditions requires attention to the institutional and political contexts through which crises are defined, measured, evaluated, and governed. China is a particularly important setting for critical accounting research on polycrisis, given its global economic significance and distinctive configurations of state, market, and society, which offer valuable opportunities to examine accounting’s role in governing interconnected crises. For the Australasian academic community, engagement with China is particularly meaningful because of its extensive economic, institutional, and societal connections with Australia and New Zealand. How crises are governed in China and made visible and calculable through accounting has significant implications for organisations, communities, and public policy across the region.

Rather than seeking definitive answers, this panel creates space to explore the possibilities, boundaries, and challenges of critical accounting research on China, particularly under conditions of polycrisis. It asks what makes such research “critical”; how insights developed through research in other jurisdictions inform, but also constrain, the study of China; and how research grounded in China might challenge or extend critical accounting scholarship more broadly. The panel will also consider theoretical and methodological approaches to examining accounting and accountability amid polycrisis in China, together with the conceptual, methodological, and practical challenges confronting researchers

To be announced