Social accounting definition
/What is Social Accounting?
Social accounting measures the environmental and social impact of an organization. This approach goes beyond the normal formulation of financial statements to also measure a firm's impact on stakeholders. Thus, social accounting can be used to determine the accountability of an organization. This approach is an especially useful tool for nonprofits and government entities, since their missions are more targeted at improving socially and environmentally relevant activities. The active measurement and use of social accounting allows managers to focus on those actions that are especially important to stakeholders, thereby improving the acceptance of the organization over the long term.
The Impact of Social Accounting on Accounting Systems
Accounting systems are not designed to accommodate the additional information requirements of social accounting. Accounting systems are focused on the proper recordation of business transactions, and so have no way to record environmental and social impacts. This being the case, the additional reporting requirements of social accounting are typically handled manually, with a separate system that is not integrated into the accounting system.