Disclosure of social responsibility information in the annual reports of GCC commercial banks: An empirical study

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to determine the extent of disclosure and quality of the areas of social responsibility information in the annual reports of 65 GCC banks listed on the GCC stock markets in 2014, as well as determining the relationship between the size of these banks' capital and their disclosure of their social responsibility information. To achieve the objectives of the study and answer its questions, the content of the annual reports was analyzed by constructing a 26-item Social Responsibility Index. The study revealed that the disclosure of social responsibility information in the Gulf banks is still low, although all banks disclose one or more areas of social responsibility information. The disclosure of these items was below average by 42.90%, in which all financial markets, except UAE markets, Bahrain's banks topped 53.30%, Qatar 50% and Dubai Banks 19.23%. Human resources were first followed by the local community, then the product or service, and finally the environment, and by a very small percentage. All the banks disclosed the compensation information for the employees, while the green building information was not disclosed, and the descriptive disclosure in all markets followed by mixed and quantitative. The study also found that there is no impact of the size of capital on the disclosure of the social responsibility information of Gulf banks. The study concluded with a number of recommendations, most important of which is the need to establish an approved index for the disclosure of social responsibility information by integrating and unifying efforts from all responsible parties, issuing binding laws for disclosure and using this as an indicator of measuring the performance of banks and also devel