I argue that our understanding of auditing as a normatively hermeneuti
cal (interpretative) practice is deformed by the emergence of scientis
m and technocratic rationality in auditing, and, relatedly, that the a
uditor's understanding of auditing's judgmental character is displaced
by the recent development of arid reliance on highly structured audit
methodologies. The result is that auditing no longer knows ''itself''
as a hermeneutical practice, with the further consequence that audito
rs may lose their capacity for moral and critical and hence for moral
agency with respect to their actions qua auditor For this claim I draw
on Aristotelian arguments about phronesis or practical ethical reason
ing about good action. The point is not that there is an earlier Golde
n Age of auditing to recover, but rather that the auditor's potentiali
ty for realizing ''the good'' in auditing through phronesis eroded by
the technocratic deformity of practice.