Corporate Social and Environment‐related Governance Disclosure Practices in the Textile and Garment Industry: Evidence from a Developing Country

We investigate the social and environment‐related governance disclosure practices of a sample of textile and garment companies operating within Bangladesh. Using content analysis we find that the disclosure of governance information lags behind general corporate social responsibility disclosures, and the textile and garment companies of Bangladesh disclose information about their governance practices in order to secure/maintain legitimacy and/or to meet community expectations. However, the governance disclosures still fall short of what would appear to be expected by the international community, and despite ongoing international concerns about workplace conditions and associated safety, the results suggest limited accountability and transparency in relation to social and environment‐related governance practices within a developing country context.     

Responding to a corruption crisis through disclosure and remedial action: The case of Petrobras

This case study adopts a positivist perspective to examine how Petroleo Brasileiro S.A (“Petrobras”), a high-profile company in its native Brazil with multiple listings including in Brazil and the US, responded to a major corruption scandal arising in 2014. We consider Petrobras's response both in terms of its visible activities – i.e. in relation to anti-corruption and compliance (“ACC”) disclosures in its annual report (AR) and sustainability report (SR), as well as actioned remedial policies that constitute the crisis plan – and how the company went about interacting with stakeholders during and after the immediate crisis period. We conducted a content analysis of ACC disclosures and assessed Petrobras's remedial activities in the eight-year period 2010–2017 as disclosed in its ARs, SRs and press releases. We find firstly that, consistent with legitimacy theory, Petrobras responded by voluntarily and substantially increasing its relevant disclosures so as to regain legitimacy, a finding which mirrors those found elsewhere following corruption and environmental crises. Secondly, the unique corporate governance situation at Petrobras combined with the fact that leadership was allegedly implicated in the scandal, led the post-crisis management team to undertake a series of remedial actions that prioritised the need to take and maintain executive control and independence from the government, whilst at the same time carefully managing the relationship with this influential stakeholder: - actions which argue strongly in favour of stakeholder-agency theory and multiple agency theory interpretations of the nature of stakeholder interactions that transpired during the crisis period of disequilibrium, and which precluded the type of stakeholder dialogue seen in some previous environmental crisis situations. Finally, we show that Petrobras's crisis management response actions align well with models of trust repair and legitimacy management, and suggest the company considered it had successfully regained legitimacy by 2017.     

Can less environmental disclosure have a legitimising effect? Evidence from Africa

Organizational legitimacy theory predicts that corporations will do whatever they regard as necessary in order to preserve their image of a legitimate business with legitimate aims and methods of achieving it. Legitimacy is mostly used in the social and environmental accounting research (SEAR) literature to support the idea that social disclosures will be maintained at present levels, or increased over time, to avert legitimacy crises. However, the SEAR literature contains some references to reasons for, and incidents of, reductions in social disclosures. We submit that legitimacy theory predicts these reductions as much as it predicts maintaining or increasing disclosure levels.We conduct a content analysis of more than 140 corporate annual reports over a 9-year period in order to identify the trends in environmental disclosure by South African companies over time. We find a reduction in environmental reporting after an initial period of increases for both Mining companies and Top-100 industrial companies. The decrease for Mining companies was bigger than that for Top-100 companies, both overall and when the results were split between specific and general information. The publication of general and specific information increased from 1994 to 1999; disclosure of specific information then declined by five times more than the decline in disclosure of general information. These trends are consistent with legitimacy theory and we conclude that legitimising objectives may also be served by changing the type (general/specific) or reducing the volume of environmental disclosures.     

Corporate Governance,Companies’ Disclosure Practices and Market Transparency: A Cross Country Study

We examine the link between corporate governance, companies’ disclosure practices and their equity market transparency in a study of more than 5,000 listed companies in 23 countries covering the period 1 January 2003 to 31 December 2008. Our results confirm the belief that better‐governed firms make more frequent disclosures to the market. We also find greater disclosure in common law relative to code law countries. However firms with better governance in both code and common law countries make more frequent disclosures. We measure market transparency by the timeliness of prices. In contrast to single country studies, results show, for the 23 countries collectively, better corporate governance is associated with less timely share prices. This would suggest that a firm substitutes better corporate governance for transparency. We are thus led to the conclusion that even if information is disclosed more frequently by better‐governed firms, it does not necessarily follow that information is reflected in share prices on a timelier basis.     

Sustainability Risk Disclosure Practices of Listed Companies in Australia

This paper investigates the extent to which the top 100 ASX listed companies disclosed economic, environmental and social sustainability risk factors during the 2014/15 financial year in light of the changes introducing Recommendation 7.4 to the third edition of the Corporate Governance Principles and Recommendations in 2014. While all companies complied with the Recommendation, questions of substance over form were raised because some companies had risks that were not disclosed according to Recommendation 7.4. Our conclusion outlines how this research contributes to the growing literature on sustainability and corporate governance. We add to the continuing debate on mandatory versus voluntary disclosures, advocating that Australia may need to introduce mandatory guidelines, beyond the ASX, to regulate the disclosure of material economic, environmental and social risks. Additionally, we conclude that Recommendation 7.4 is unlikely to substantially change Australian corporate reporting and disclosure practices – that, for most companies, it is ‘business as usual’. However, under business as usual, we can naturally expect to see further increases in sustainability and alternative reporting frameworks, such as integrated reporting, as well as increasing use of the Internet to report and disclose sustainability risks.     

Extent of corporate governance disclosure by banks and finance companies listed on Nepal Stock Exchange

Corporate governance disclosure has seen renewed interest by researchers, policy makers, and regulating bodies internationally, but has remained only an emerging construct in Nepal. The primary purpose of this study was to assess the extent of mandatory corporate governance disclosure in Nepal. The secondary purpose was to examine the associations between the extent of disclosures and five firm-specific characteristics. The third purpose was to assess the significant determinants to explain variations of disclosures. The study's sampling frame consisted of 125 banking and finance companies listed on Nepal Stock Exchange. A sample size of 59 companies was randomly selected. On average, companies disclosed 91% of items in the mandatory category, 48% in the voluntary category, and 74% in total. A significant positive correlation existed between governance disclosures and firm characteristics of size, leverage, and foreign ownership. There was no significant relation between governance disclosure and listing age or profitability. With regards to determinants, bank size was a significant predictor of governance disclosure. Three regression models for total disclosures (DScore), mandatory disclosures [DScore (M)], and voluntary disclosures [DScore (V)] with three predictors of size, leverage, and foreign ownership were significant and explained 47%, 24%, and 54% variations respectively in total, mandatory, and voluntary corporate governance disclosures in Nepal. This research provides guidelines to policy makers and standard setters for developing future regulations and accounting policies.     

Corporate Social and Environmental Responsibility Reporting Practices from an Emerging Mobile Telecommunications Market

This study examines corporate social responsibility reporting practices in the rapidly growing mobile telecommunications industry in Bangladesh. This industry sector is one of the fastest growing in the world making it an attractive global investment. Using content analysis we reviewed and analysed the annual reports of four major mobile companies between 2008 and 2011. The findings reveal that mobile telecommunications companies in Bangladesh disclose social and environmental responsibility information across a range of categories. We find that these mobile companies provide significant benefits to education and health in Bangladesh and that their focus on community and development disclosures are motivated in part by seeking to maintain legitimacy in an extremely competitive industry.     

Corporate Climate Change‐Related Governance Practices and Related Disclosures: Evidence from Australia

This paper investigates the climate change‐related corporate governance disclosure practices of five major Australian energy‐intensive companies over a 16‐year period. In doing so, a content analysis instrument is developed to identify disclosures made in relation to various policies and procedures the organisations have in place for addressing the issues associated with climate change. This instrument is applied to the respective companies’ annual reports and sustainability reports. An increasing trend is found in companies’ climate change‐related corporate governance disclosures over time; however, in many instances the disclosures provide limited insights into the climate change‐related risks and opportunities confronting the sample companies.     

Anti-bribery disclosures: A response to networked governance

This study examined the posited link between networked governance (the activities of NGOs and the media) and the anti-bribery disclosures of two global telecommunication companies. Based on a joint consideration of legitimacy theory, media agenda setting theory and responsive regulation, the findings show that anti-bribery disclosures are positively associated with the activities of the media and NGO initiatives. The findings also show that companies make anti-bribery disclosures to maintain symbolic legitimacy but are less prominent in effecting a substantive change in their accountability practices.     

Corporate governance and the informativeness of disclosures in Australia: a re‐examination

We re‐examine the association between corporate governance and disclosures reported by Beekes and Brown (2006), using an extended time series of Australian data. Since the ASX corporate governance guidelines were introduced in 2003, firms generally have increased their disclosure frequency and demonstrated an improvement in the timeliness of bad news relative to good news, indicating a levelling of disclosure practices and greater transparency. Better governed firms have become more cautious in their disclosure practices. However, they continue to be more balanced with respect to good and bad news timeliness. Changes to disclosure laws have also influenced company practices.