CHALLENGES OF SOCIAL ACCOUNTING IN THE SPHERE OF THE MEASUREMENT OF NATIONAL INTELLECTUAL CAPITAL (NIC)

Abstract

The aim of the paper is to present the problem of measuring intellectual capital in the perspective of social accounting that is used for recognizing economic processes in the macroeconomic scale. The realization of the purpose took place on the basis of the analysis of literature and documents published by international organizations. The conducted research enabled formulation of the assumption that the measurement of intellectual capital is a difficult task and is related to the complex character of this category. So far noone has formed such definition of national intellectual capital that would be universally accepted and would clearly specify its scope. Additionally, there is no agreement as regards the taxonomy of NIC, owing to which the components of intellectual capital specified by particular authors are varied. Despite the indicated difficulties the techniques of social accounting and their applications must be constantly developed so that they enabled the measurement of NIC. Therefore, there are undertaken initiatives that aim at elaborating both methods and techniques that will enable the measurement of NIC. From the perspective of social accounting particular importance is attached to those initiatives that are undertaken by international institutions.

Keywords

• social accounting
• national intellectual capital (nic)
• the measurement of nic