Stakeholder Relevance for Reporting: Explanatory Factors of Carbon Disclosure. (March 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Guenther, Edeltraud; Guenther, Thomas; Schiemann, Frank; Weber, Gabriel
• Other Names: Busch Timo guest-editor.; Bauer Rob guest-editor.; Orlitzky Marc guest-editor.
• Is Part Of: Business and society. Volume 55:Number 3(2016)
• Page Start: 361
• Page End: 397
• Publication Date: 2016-03
• Subjects: carbon disclosure -- carbon performance -- climate change -- stakeholder theory -- corporate social responsibility (CSR) -- sustainability reporting; Industries -- Social aspects -- Periodicals; Industrial sociology -- Periodicals; Business ethics -- Periodicals; 306.3
• DOI: 10.1177/0007650315575119
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0007-6503

Abstract

Although stakeholder theory is widely accepted in environmental disclosure research, empirical evidence about the role of stakeholders in firms' disclosure is still scarce. The authors address this issue for a setting of carbon disclosure. Our international sample comprises the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) Global 500, S&P 500, and FTSE 350 reports from 2008 to 2011, resulting in a total of 1, 120 firms with 3, 631 firm-year observations. The authors apply Tobit regressions to analyze the relationship between carbon disclosure and the relevance of the following stakeholder groups: government, general public, media, employees, and customers. Our results confirm that in addition to carbon performance, all stakeholders are associated with carbon disclosure. Only one stakeholder group (government) acts as a moderator for the relationship between carbon performance and carbon disclosure. Furthermore, the authors find that carbon performance but not the affiliation to a carbon-intensive industry acts as a moderator between stakeholder relevance and carbon disclosure.