Corporate purpose and early disaster response: Providing evidence of dynamic materiality?

Abstract

AbstractThis paper examines the relationship between corporate purpose and disaster response. To that aim, we use a unique dataset generated by Just Capital's COVID‐19 response tracker that characterizes the early responses of 928 companies included in the Russell 1000 Index generated by the COVID‐19 pandemic. We marry this data to the Business Roundtable Statement on the Purpose of a Corporation (BRT‐CPS) signatories list, which includes 210 firms that declared “a fundamental commitment to all stakeholders” as their corporate purpose. We estimate the differential impact of BRT‐CPS signees on the rest. After controlling our results with financial indicators and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) data, we convey that BRT‐CPS signees were more likely to develop strategies that benefited their surrounding communities and other stakeholders. Moreover, corporations with high ESG were less likely to have an early response that directly benefited stakeholders other than shareholders, except for layoffs and unpaid leave. Finally, we discuss the outcomes considering the symbolic management theory, corporate purpose literature, and its relation to stakeholder management.