Lars Östman towards a general theory of financial control

At the beginning of the 21st century 

 

Previous trends involving separation, concentration, networking and cooperation with minor 

and major surrounding parties had shaped conditions for the beginning of the 21

st

 century. 

Complex constellations were rather common. In horizontal processes, many parties were 

involved and they had, to some extent, a common interest in making an entire chain work. 

On the other hand, each party had its own separate benefits and uncertainties, short-term and 

long-term, financially and in operational terms. Within the public sector, for the most part, 

strict accountability in budgetary terms reinforced this structural behaviour. Pricing made it 

even more striking in business life. Previously, a use perspective for a long horizontal chain 

had been sufficient within the frames of an extensive financial unit. With the new structure, 

exchange values were necessary in several steps and strategic considerations within every 

such step.  

The interplay between super-national bodies, nations and multinational organisations had 

developed a new pattern. International mergers and acquisitions had tended to create groups 

with Swedish entities as subsidiaries and a group headquarter somewhere else. The public 

sphere had a national context. The national state was not an ultimate control subject to the 

same unconditional extent as before. Control and support activities with national aims 

needed to be considered in the multinational context as well. 

Coverage by the mass media and analysts remained intense. However, the internet 

induced two-way communication without gate-keeping but often with powerful post-use 

information routines.  Potentially, all this could have a great effect on vertical and horizontal 

processes of organisations both in the private and the public sphere.