Is it a sententious claim? An examination of the quality of occupational health,safety and well-being disclosures in global reporting initiative reports across industries and countries

The study attempts to reveal differences in the quality of information disclosed on occupational health, safety (OHS) and well-being in 250 sustainability reports within and between large companies in different industries and countries (i.e., market economies). Using a mixed research design, our results indicate that industry affiliation and type of market economy have no significant influence on the quality of disclosure on OHS and well-being aspects. Instead, companies tend to disclose information on legal requirements and OHS standards to secure their social legitimacy. However, in the finance, insurance, and real estate industry groups, membership in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index emerged as an influencing factor on the quality of disclosures on employees’ well-being. In general, companies merely disclose sententious information about OHS and well-being in disclosures of management approaches in the Global Reporting Initiative, and otherwise rarely attempt to translate their claims into outcomes. Contributions to institutional theories and practices are discussed.     

Corporate Governance Quality and CSR Disclosures

Given the increasing importance attached to both corporate social responsibility (CSR) and corporate governance, this study investigates the association between these two complimentary mechanisms used by companies to enhance relations with stakeholders. Consistent with both legitimacy and stakeholder theory and controlling for industry profile, firm size, stockholder power/dispersion, creditor power/leverage, and economic performance, our analysis of the annual reports for a sample of 222 listed companies suggests that firms providing more CSR information: have better corporate governance ratings; are larger; belong to higher profile industries; and are more highly leveraged. Our findings support the limited prior research suggesting a link between corporate governance quality and CSR disclosure in company annual reports and suggest that, rather than mandating specific disclosures, regulators might be better served focussing on corporate governance quality as a way of increasing CSR disclosures.     

The Supply of Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosures Among U.S. Firms

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a dramatically expanding area of activity for managers and academics. Consumer demand for responsibly produced and fair trade goods is swelling, resulting in increased demands for CSR activity and information. Assets under professional management and invested with a social responsibility focus have also grown dramatically over the last 10 years. Investors choosing social responsibility investment strategies require access to information not provided through traditional financial statements and analyses. At the same time, a group of mainstream institutional investors has encouraged a movement to incorporate environmental, social, and governance information into equity analysis, and multi-stakeholder groups have supported enhanced business reporting on these issues. The majority of research in this area has been performed on European and Australian firms. We expand on this literature by exploring the CSR disclosure practices of a size- and industry-stratified sample of 50 publicly traded U.S. firms, performing a content analysis on the complete identifiable public information portfolio provided by these firms during 2004. CSR activity was disclosed by most firms in the sample, and was included in nearly half of public disclosures made during that year by the sample firms. Areas of particular emphasis are community matters, health and safety, diversity and human resources (HR) matters, and environmental programs. The primary venues of disclosure are mass media releases such as corporate websites and press releases, followed closely by disclosures contained in mandatory filings. Consistent with prior research, we identify industry effects in terms of content, emphasis, and reporting format choices. Unlike prior research, we can offer only mixed evidence on the existence of a size effect. The disclosure frequency and emphasis is significantly different for the largest one-fifth of the firms, but no identifiable trends are present within the rest of the sample. There are, however, identifiable size effects with respect to reporting format choice. Use of websites is positively related to firm size, while the use of mandatory filings is negatively related to firm size. Finally, and also consistent with prior literature, we document a generally self-laudatory tone in the content of CSR disclosures for the sample firms.     

Born with a silver spoon of legitimacy but struggling for identity? The paradox of emerging spin-offs in a new sector

This study examines one paradox of the spinning-off process—on one hand, a spin-off's affiliation with the parent firm provides legitimacy that it can leverage for success; on the other hand, a stronger affiliation with the parent firm makes it difficult for a spin-off to resolve identity ambiguity and develop its novel identity in a new sector. The context of this study is a spin-off created by a reputable manufacturing firm but venturing in the software sector. I highlight challenges faced by the executives in leveraging spin-off's legitimacy at the same time it seeks to move away from the parent for developing a new identity. I find that a combination of the processes of sensegiving by a proactive leadership and applied sensemaking by the members is critical in resolving identity ambiguity. The study further develops propositions that synthesize the findings and contribute to the literatures of identity, legitimacy, and entrepreneurship.     

企业实际所得税率影响因素及其稳定性研究——来自我国A股上市公司的经验证据

本文采用中国非金融类A股1998—2004年425家上市公司合计2975个样本观察值的面板数据,应用随机效应模型,深入研究了影响企业实际所得税税率（ETR）的公司特征因素,在此基础上探讨了税收政策（《他000》）的变动对这些因素的影响。结果表明,上市公司规模、固定资产密度与ETR没有显著性关系;财务杠杆与ETR呈显著性负相关;同时还发现过度雇佣职工会获得地方政府的税收优惠;但盈利能力与股权结构对ETR的影响受税收政策变动的影响,当上市公司普遍享受税收优惠时,它们与ETR呈显著正相关。当税收政策变动后,它们对ETR的影响不再显著,税收的中立性得到体现。     

A Critical Assessment of Basel III and its Implications on the Mauritian Banking Sector

This paper probes into the application of Basel III in Mauritius. Findings show that although Mauritian banks are well-capitalized and carry excess liquidity, they will have to restructure their balance sheets by incorporating highly liquid assets such as government securities. While Basel III will foster greater financial stability, this will translate into lower supply of credit, higher cost of credit and lower returns with potential strains on SME lending. Similarly, Bank of Mauritius’s ability to control credit growth will be hindered because banks’ existing leverage ratios are already higher than the stipulated minimum leverage ratio of 3%. To harness the full benefits of the reforms, additional measures tailored to the specificities of the Mauritian economy will be needed. Other challenges prevail like establishing robust data management, risk methodologies, reporting systems and IT architecture as well as identifying the timing and the size of the Countercyclical Capital Buffer. Local banks anticipate Basel IV in the coming years as a refined tool.     

Corporate Social Responsibility in franchise chains: Specificities,insights from French franchise chains’ CSD,and avenues for future research

Although franchise chains are increasingly committed to environmental, social, and societal transitions, only a few researchers have focused on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in the specific case of franchising. The aim of our paper is to discuss the specificities and challenges of CSR in franchising, explore how franchisors report on their sustainable practices, and emphasize subsequent directions for future research. In order to do so, we focus on the Corporate Social Disclosure (CSD) practices of twenty-two retail and service franchisors operating in the French market where regulations of non-financial information disclosures exist for large companies. Our findings show that these franchisors disclose rich and diversified information about their CSR activities. However, franchisors’ disclosures can vary significantly, especially depending on their chain size and whether they are subject to reporting regulations. Our research contributes to the literature on CSR in franchise chains, as well as the practice.     

Determinants of Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosure Ratings by Spanish Listed Firms

The aim of this paper is to analyze whether a number of firm and industry characteristics, as well as media exposure, are potential determinants of corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure practices by Spanish listed firms. Empirical studies have shown that CSR disclosure activism varies across companies, industries, and time (Gray et al., Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal 8(2), 47–77, 1995; Journal of Business Finance & Accounting 28(3/4), 327–356, 2001; Hackston and Milne, Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal 9(1), 77–108, 1996; Cormier and Magnan, Journal of International Financial Management and Accounting 1(2), 171–195, 2003; Cormier et al., European Accounting Review 14(1), 3–39, 2005), which is usually justified by reference to several theoretical constructs, such as the legitimacy, stakeholder, and agency theories. Our findings evidence that firms with higher CSR ratings present a statistically significant larger size and a higher media exposure, and belong to more environmentally sensitive industries, as compared to firms with lower CSR ratings. However, neither profitability nor leverage seem to explain differences in CSR disclosure practices between Spanish listed firms. The most influential variable for explaining firms’ variation in CSR ratings is media exposure, followed by size and industry. Therefore, it seems that the legitimacy theory, as captured by those variables related to public or social visibility, is the most relevant theory for explaining CSR disclosure practices of Spanish listed firms.     

Patterns of social reporting from an Islamic framework and the moral legitimacy factors that influence them

The objective of this study is twofold: to examine the patterns that govern social reporting with reference to an Islamic framework and to identify the moral legitimacy factors that influence them. We select 146 publicly listed Sharia‐compliant companies and classify the disclosures in their annual reports according to an Islamic framework that categorises items as either Required, Expected or Desired to indicate the degree of importance each item carries from an Islamic perspective. Based on this framework, we then analyse moral legitimacy factors, specifically the type of Sharia screening body and the proportion of Muslims in the population, that may influence the prioritisation of the different categories of social reporting. We find that disclosures that fall into the Required category of our framework—especially those that relate to companies’ involvement in “haram” activities (activities not permissible in Islam)—are still few among the companies studied. Our research also reveals that both moral legitimacy factors under investigation influence the three categories of social reporting, although in different ways. This research contributes to the existing literature by empirically examining how organisations prioritise their disclosure of virtues and the moral legitimacy factors that influence that prioritisation.     

Corporate Governance and Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosures: Evidence from an Emerging Economy

We examine the relationship between corporate governance and the extent of corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosures in the annual reports of Bangladeshi companies. A legitimacy theory framework is adopted to understand the extent to which corporate governance characteristics, such as managerial ownership, public ownership, foreign ownership, board independence, CEO duality and presence of audit committee influence organisational response to various stakeholder groups. Our results suggest that although CSR disclosures generally have a negative association with managerial ownership, such relationship becomes significant and positive for export-oriented industries. We also find public ownership, foreign ownership, board independence and presence of audit committee to have positive significant impacts on CSR disclosures. However, we fail to find any significant impact of CEO duality. Thus, our results suggest that pressures exerted by external stakeholder groups and corporate governance mechanisms involving independent outsiders may allay some concerns relating to family influence on CSR disclosure practices. Overall, our study implies that corporate governance attributes play a vital role in ensuring organisational legitimacy through CSR disclosures. The findings of our study should be of interest to regulators and policy makers in countries which share similar corporate ownership and regulatory structures.     

Are the determinants of capital structure country or firm specific?

In this paper we investigate the capital structure determinants of Greek, French, Italian, and Portuguese small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). We compare the capital structures of SMEs across countries and differences in country characteristics, asset structure, size, profitability, risk, and growth and how these may impact capital structure choices. The results show that SMEs in these countries determine their capital structure in similar ways. We attribute these similarities to the country institutional and financial characteristics and the commonality of their civil law systems. However, structural differences arise due to firm specific effects. We find that size is positively related to leverage while the relationship between leverage and asset structure, profitability and risk is negative. Growth is not a statistically significant determinant of leverage for any of the four countries. Our main conclusion is that firm-specific rather than country facts explain differences in capital structure choices of SMEs.     

Quantity and quality of information and SME financial structure

We test whether the amount and/or quality of financial statement information affects the financial structure of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Belgian SMEs are used, because there are important differences in disclosure and audit requirements among them. Consistent with the traditional view that asymmetric or incomplete information restricts access to external funds, our results indicate that both the amount and quality of financial statement information are positively related to SME leverage. In addition, we find that leverage is positively related to asset structure, growth (prospects) and median industry leverage, and negatively related to firm age and profitability.     

Firm versus Sector Effects on Profitability and Growth: The Importance of Size and Interaction

In this study we contribute to the long‐standing debate on the impact of firm versus industry effects on firm performance in three distinct ways; firstly by testing the firm, industry and their interaction effects on performance, secondly by examining the impact of each effect for different size groups, and lastly by measuring performance in terms of sales growth in addition to profitability. We use data of 71,750 UK firms, between 2002 and 2004, and employ moderated regression analysis for three sub‐samples namely micro, SMEs and large firms. With regards to profitability, we find the interaction effect to be significant in all sub‐samples for broad level of industrial aggregation (SIC4). For narrow industrial aggregation (SIC2), the interaction effect is only significant for micro firms. Neither of the above effects is significant for sales growth.     

The role of government affiliation in explaining firm innovativeness and profitability in emerging countries: Evidence from China

Drawing from institutional polycentrism, we advance understanding of how affiliation with different government levels influences innovativeness and profitability in emerging countries. Our framework suggests that as different government levels vary in their objectives and resources, they affect firm innovativeness vis-à-vis profitability in qualitatively different ways. The analysis of 18,430 Chinese firms shows that affiliation with higher-level governments enhances firms’ innovativeness, whereas affiliation with lower-level governments is effective for enhancing profitability. Our framework also clarifies how location-specific institutional substitution occurs, indicating that the usefulness of government affiliation for innovativeness depends on how effectively legal institutions protect intellectual property in each region.     

Corporate Diversification and Firm Value: Evidence from Post‐1997 Data*

In 1997, SFAS 131 established a new segment‐reporting standard for US public companies. Using measures of diversification based on the diversity in segment‐industry characteristics and controlling for endogeneity of the diversification decision, we document a diversification premium in our post‐1997 period. We find significant positive effects of cash flow diversity, leverage diversity and profitability diversity on excess value, consistent with the efficient internal capital market hypothesis. We also find that the size of the diversification premium in the post‐1997 data is negatively correlated with the degree of diversification and positively correlated with firm size. In contrast, we find that the pre‐1998 data typically generates a diversification discount, but the effect is statistically less significant when endogeneity is controlled for. Thus, the diversification discount documented in earlier studies can be an artifact of the pre‐1998 data or a failure to control for endogeneity.     

Normativity in Environmental Reporting: A Comparison of Three Regimes

Normativity is assessed as we evaluate and compare the environmental reporting practices of a sample of French and Canadian companies through the lens of institutional legitimacy. More specifically, we examine how French and Canadian firms changed their reporting practices in reaction to the promulgation of laws and regulations in their respective countries, i.e., the NER and Grenelle II Acts in France, and National Instrument 51-102 and CSA Staff Notice NR 51-333, issued by the Canadian Securities Administrators. The firms’ voluntary disclosures according to GRI guidelines are also investigated. Substantive legitimacy theory is used to explore the level of substantive disclosures provided by Canadian and French firms. The findings reveal that the French parliamentary regime is more successful than the Canadian stock exchange regulation in triggering environmental reporting, and that the GRI combined with local regimes prompts environmental disclosures. Notwithstanding the improvements in environmental reporting under all three regimes, a very low level of substantive disclosure is noted in both countries.     

Bridging the gap: How sustainable development can help companies create shareholder value and improve financial performance

This study examines the effect of integrating sustainability into corporate strategy on various aspects of shareholder value creation and financial performance in the British capital market. The employed method is based on the content analysis of corporate disclosures and a new technique for assessing the adoption of the corporate sustainability concept (embracing the environmental, social, and financial aspects of a company's policies at the same time). Using extensive data of FTSE 350 firms covering the years 2006–2012, 65 companies were selected as meeting corporate sustainability criteria. For the above period, we find that these firms were characterized by higher financial risk exposure, lower asset growth rates, lower BV/MV ratios, lower EVA ratios, and higher MVA ratios. Such relations were generally present among different size and industry groupings. The results support the thesis that firms that incorporate sustainability issues into their business operations are better able to leverage their resources toward stronger financial performance and shareholder value creation than other companies. The paper contributes to the literature by offering a more holistic approach to corporate sustainable performance measurement and shedding additional light on its relation to financial performance in the context of the recent global financial crisis and its direct aftermath.     

The evaluative legitimacy of social entrepreneurship in capitalist welfare systems

Social entrepreneurs start ventures to tackle social problems, and these ventures have the potential to outperform other social service providers in welfare states. We leverage theories of legitimacy and Varieties of Capitalism to examine national experts’ (N = 361) assessments of the efficiency of social enterprises relative to state and civil society. Our multilevel analysis across 11 welfare states shows that social enterprises are perceived as a more efficient solution to social problems when a liberal or socialist logic dominates a given state’s market coordination and social welfare provision. However, when institutional logics are in conflict, the assigned legitimacy of social entrepreneurship is diminished.     

Is certification an effective legitimacy strategy for foreign firms in emerging markets?

This study explores the effect of certification on profitability in a transition economy. Obtaining a certification is a strategic legitimacy action that positively affects a firm’s profitability, specifically for a foreign firm in a transition economy, where institutions are less developed and stable. However, we argue that certification is particularly effective if legitimacy based on adaptation to local circumstances is weak. An analysis of data from 319 MNE subsidiaries in China over the period 1998–2009 largely supports our hypotheses. Certification is an effective strategic action which improves profitability. However, the strength of this effect is influenced by the level of marketization of the host region, the institutional quality in the home country, the density of the foreign firm community in the host country, the number of years the foreign firm has been in the host country, and the size of the foreign firm. These findings throw light on the role certification can play in helping firms overcome the liability of foreignness in a transition economy.     

非上市中小企业资本结构的决定因素分析

本文利用11723家非上市中小企业的财务数据,分析反映企业特征的因素与财务杠杆之间的关系。研究发现,在全体中小企业、国有中小企业以及民营中小企业,企业规模对长期负债率和总负债率产生正的影响,盈利性对长期负债率和总负债率产生负的影响,资产的有形性对长期负债率具有正的影响,而与总负债率之间呈负相关关系。成长性仅对全体企业和民营企业的资本结构具有一定的影响,而非债务税盾的影响较弱。企业规模、盈利性和资产的有形性是中小企业资本结构的重要影响因素。研究结果基本上支持权衡理论和优序融资理论的观点。