The thesis deals with the relationships between property and power in business groups through an empirical analysis of management accounting practices. In a context of high uncertainty about economic performances, forecast and reporting exercises are opportunities for actors in business groups to assert their power over each others. Nevertheless, settlements between parent companies and heads of subsidiaries go beyond the mere optimization of economic appraisals. The ability to process financial information is at the core of each actor's strategy to settle its position in the subtle division of labour that operates within business groups. Parent companies for example intend to be in control of management accounting software and guides of procedures in order to comfort their position as unavoidable parties in decision making processes. Subsidiary executives who keep control of the necessary resources to produce their own financial information are better able to escape this supervision. Lastly, management accountants do partition the circulation of information between business entities and privilege interlocutors with spheres of professional mobility similar to theirs. In brief, management accounting is a stage in-between control and management instances that multiplies opportunities for learning via cooperation, negotiation and conflicts. Our study of the games between actors goes beyond the binary opposition suggested by agency theory and allows us to grasp the actual perimeter of business groups aloof from the mere legal and accounting markers.
