The objective of this paper is to establish the management accounting role of finance managers at international development non-governmental organisations and their role as institutional agents. Through empirical evidence from three case organisations, the management accounting role of finance managers is shown as primarily reporting on spending of specific donor grants, rather than providing insights which could help maximise the overall social impact of their organisation. This dynamic potentially limits the social impact of accounting in such organisations, and potentially in the wider sector. The findings suggest finance managers, by focusing on donor-compliance, do not act as ‘definers’ of institutional elements of management accounting.

本文的目的是确立财务经理在国际发展非政府组织中的管理会计角色及其作为机构代理人的角色。通过来自三个案例组织的经验证据，财务经理的管理会计角色主要是报告特定捐助者赠款的支出，而不是提供有助于最大化其组织整体社会影响的见解。这种动态可能会限制会计在此类组织中以及可能在更广泛的部门中的社会影响。调查结果表明，财务经理通过关注捐助者的合规性，并没有充当管理会计制度要素的“定义者”。