Taking a ‘Parallax view’ on what we now know about CSEAR?^†

The shadows of the ‘trolls’ and ‘Blue Meanies’ can sometimes loom large over the Centre for Social & Environmental Accounting Research (CSEAR) community, making it understandably tempting to view ourselves as ‘refugees’. This can be a possible source of motivation, but a more positive perspective is needed if we are to respond to the issues raised by Correa and Laine (2013. “Struggling Against Like-Minded Conformity to Enliven SEAR: A Call for Passion.” Social and Environmental Accountability Journal 33 (3): 134–144). We could do worse than heed the advice of Alvesson and Sandberg (2013), who argue that, rather than seeing ourselves as ‘victims of the system’, there are grounds to turn this argument round, and instead explore the problem from a ‘we are in charge of the system’ perspective.