This paper is a reaction to and extension of Kilfoyle and Richardson’s (K&R) paper “Agency
and structure in budgeting: thesis, antithesis and synthesis” [Critical Perspectives on
Accounting, 2011;2:183–199] with the aim of contributing to the ongoing discussion about
how to conceptualize agency and structure in management accounting research. More
specifically, while we fully sympathize with K&R’s overall conclusion that a duality perspective
(as opposed to dualism) has the best potential to address the intriguing paradox
of embedded agency, we also argue that some of their writings open up for multiple interpretations,
of which some may be problematic if we want to dissolve the separation of
agency and structure. As a reaction to this, we propose a number of specifications resulting
in a duality perspective which is grounded in a ‘flat and local’ ontology. This perspective,
in turn, forms the basis for the development of a general framework which identifies four
principal origins of embedded agency, of which K&R mainly discuss one. In relation to K&R,
our paper thus extends their line of argument by suggesting a number of interesting, yet
largely unexplored avenues for future management accounting research