Professor Chris Carter
Professor of Strategy

Tel: 0191 208 1679 

Email: christopher.carter@ncl.ac.uk 

Chris Carter is a social scientist who writes about strategy and politics, the accountancy profession, and strategy and the media. He teaches strategy at Newcastle University. 

REF:

My current REF submission will be drawn from:

Jeacle, I. and Carter, C., 2011, In TripAdvisor we trust: rankings, calculative regimes and abstract systems, Accounting, Organizations and Society. 3, 293 - 309.

Kornberger, M. and Carter, C., 2010, Manufacturing Competition: How Accounting Practices Shape Strategy Making in Cities, Accounting, Auditing and Accountability 23(3): 325 - 349.

Kornberger, M, Carter, C., and Ross-Smith, A., 2010, Changing gender domination in a Big Four Accounting Firm: Flexibility, performance and client service in practice. Accounting, Organizations and Society 35 (8): 775 - 791.

Brown, A., Kornberger, M., Clegg, S., and Carter, C., 2010, The 'Invisible walls' and 'Silent hierachies': A Case study of power relations in an architecture firm, Human Relations, 63 (4), 525-549.

Carter, C., Clegg, S., and Kornberger, M., 2008, Strategy as Practice? Strategic Organization, 6 (1), 83 - 99. 

Latest News & Upcoming Events:

May 7th - 11th: European Accounting Association conference, Ljubljana.  Presented 'Big Four in the Spotlight'. 

April 16th - 27th: Vacation. 

April 11th: Trip to KPMG Newcastle.  

April 4th: Peter Skaerbeck, Actor-Network Theorist from Copenhagen Business School, presented at Edinburgh University. The talk was on the 'blame game' that ensued a restructuring of the Danish police force.

April 3rd: Arthur's Seat Run. 

April 2nd: Storytelling Workshop at Newcastle University Business School, organized by SOS group member, Stephanie Reissner. Speakers included Mike Humphreys, John Sillince and Ben Golant.

March 26th - 29th: Trip to London and the British Library.  Working on BBC project.

March 23rd: Research at the Sillince Institute, Glasgow.  

March 21st: New Professor Induction.  

March 19th: New building is opened. Great lecture from Lord Burns on the four recessions of his professional life. 

March 15th: Alastair Campbell / Chris Mullin visited the Business School for a Business Breakfast on the 'Professionalization of Politics' (see picture). Alastair and Chris talked about the strategy and organization of the New Labour period. In particular, they talked about the impact of the 1992 election defeat on the Labour Party, relations between New Labour and Rupert Murdoch. Afterwards, Charles Harvey, John Sillince and I interviewed Alastair Campbell.

March 8th: Externalling at Edinburgh University. 

March 7th: 'Theorists who lunch' event at the Business School. Some great presentations from members of the SOS group.

March 2nd: Presentation at Strathclyde Business School, on the BBC and Producer Choice.

February 19th - 23rd: Trip to University of the United Arab Emirates, to work with Professor Crawford Spence. Presenting on Strategic Change in the BBC & Change in the Big Four. The Emirates is fast becoming a hub for Critical / Interpretative Accounting. 'Best Accounting Group East of LSE and West of Sydney'.

February 15th: 'Theorists who lunch' event at the Business School.

February 15th: Interview with Chris Mullin. Diarist extraordinaire and eminent parliamentarian. Tremendous insights into New Labour, strategy and the political process.

SOS

Chris's brief at Newcastle is to establish the Strategy, Organizations and Society group and research network. The premise of SOS is that strategy is a cultural, political and organization phenomena as well as an economic one. Consequently, SOS seeks to re-frame the study of strategy through the use of social and organizational theory, thus making it an intepretative and creative social science in its own right and one capable of connecting with broader social, cultural and political issues. 

Biopic

Chris Carter is from Cornwall and holds a chair in strategy at Newcastle University. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Chris is a social scientist and writes about strategy and politics, strategy and the media, and the accounting profession. Most of his academic training is in organization theory (MSc, PhD) which he studied at Aston University in the 1990s. Chris worked at the University of Leicester (1999-2002), before spending nearly a decade at the University of St Andrews (2002-2011) in Scotland, where he was a professor between 2006 and 2011. At St Andrews, Chris served as co-director of research (2006 – 2009) and co-wrote the School of Management’s RAE submission. He is also visiting professor at the University of Technology, Sydney.

Academic Employment

2011 - present: Professor, Newcastle University

2006 - 2011: Professor, University of St Andrews

2004 - 2006: Reader, University of St Andrews

2002 - 2004: Lecturer, University of St Andrews

1999 - 2002: Research Associate, University of Leicester

1998 - 1999: Lecturer, University of North London

 

Current Research

Chris is a social scientist and in recent years his research has mainly been in strategy and accounting. His research focuses on, (i) the power and politics of strategy, and (ii) the connections between strategy and accounting. His empirical interests focus on political organizations, the media, and the accountancy profession. A characteristic of Chris' work is that it uses social theory to connect macro changes with what is going on in specific locales. His work is particularly influenced by the writings of Pierre Bourdieu and Anthony Giddens, respectively. In the Business School world scholars such as Stewart Clegg, Peter Clark, David Cooper, Barbara Czarniawska, Yves Gendron, Peter Miller and Mike Power are major influences on his research.

Chris has published in journals such as Accounting, Auditing and Accountability, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Human Relations, Organization, Organization Studies and Strategic Organization. He is currently editing a special issue of Business History on the ‘Age of Strategy’. He has the good fortune to be working with Stewart Clegg (UTS), Ingrid Jeacle (Edinburgh University), Alan McKinlay (Heriot Watt University), Frank Mueller (University of St Andrews), John Sillince (Newcastle University), Crawford Spence (University of United Arab Emirates) and Andrea Whittle (Cardiff University). Chris sits on the editorial boards of Accounting, Organizations and Society, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, European Accounting Review, and Organization. He is proud to serve as an associate editor of Organization journal and Critical Perspectives on Accounting journal.

Chris is currently working on the following research projects:

1. Strategy & Change in the BBC: This project, carried out with Alan McKinlay (Heriot Watt University), seeks to investigate the changes that have taken place in the BBC since the mid-1980s to 2004. In particular, it seeks to understand the relations between the State and the BBC, the long-term effects of Producer Choice, and how the changes in the BBC impacted on how programmes are made. This research is using a governmentality framework.

2. Partners in Global Accounting Firms: This research seeks to understand the globalization of the Big Four Accounting Firms,  the process of becoming a partner in a Big Four firm, and the discursive representations of partners. This research is being carried out with Crawford Spence (University of United Arab Emirates). The research uses a Bourdieusian framework.

3. Political-Economic settlements and the financial crisis:  Together with Frank Mueller (St Andrews) and Andrea Whittle (Cardiff) I am investigating the discursive devices used by financial institutions to legitimate their role during the financial crisis.

4. Strategy, Politics and New Labour: The research uses a Bourdieusian framework  to investigate the nexus between strategy, the media and politics in the New Labour period (1994 - 2010). The project is being carried out with John Sillince (Newcastle University).

5. Strategy from Below: This research is based on the 'Save our Old Town' campaign in Edinburgh.  The project uses a Bourdieusian framework.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Teaching

Chris first taught in October 1994 and since then has accrued extensive lecturing experience in organization theory, management accounting and strategy. He has lectured in the UK, Austria, Germany, Hong Kong, Norway and the United Arab Emirates. At Newcastle, he teaches strategy modules on the MBA and Executive MBA. In recent years he has co-written two texts on Strategy: A Very Short, Fairly Interesting and Reasonably Cheap Introduction to Studying Strategy, Strategy: Theory and Practice. He is currently working with David Buchanan and Richard Badham on a 3rd editon of Power, Politics and Change.

Chris has taught a range of managment subjects including the Management of Change and the Analysis of Financial Data (affectionately known as Enron Studies) at the University of St Andrews. Hehas aso taught overseas, delivering modules at Molde University College (Norway) and at Innsbruck University (Austria). He has been a long-term contributor to the MBA in Strategic Procurement at Birmingham University. At Newcastle, he teaches strategy.