Fixing the ecological crisis: the promises and pitfalls of green accounting infrastructures

Accounting was designed to facilitate economic growth and, as such, tends to reinforce dynamics that are harmful to the environment. Promoted today as a corrective, green accounting is often portrayed as a pioneering intervention. Yet, green accounting is not new. This paper situates it within a genealogy of initiatives developed since the 1980s and assesses their potential to establish an infrastructure capable of supporting a post-growth transition or redirecting capital toward nature conservation. It argues that, across its various iterations, green accounting has consistently struggled to materialize as a genuine infrastructure for either purpose. Nevertheless, the promises it carries help pre-empt capitalism’s crisis of legitimacy in the face of mounting socio-ecological crises.