Women on Boards: Do They Affect Sustainability Reporting?

Abstract

ABSTRACTSustainable reports are the basic tool used to reflect and communicate stakeholder dialogue. Therefore, sustainability reporting has become a key element for strategic management. Companies' strategies are defined and developed by their boards of directors. This study explores the relationship between sustainability reporting and the existence of at least three women on the board of directors. Our results show that in countries with a higher proportion of boards of directors with at least three women, the levels of CSR reporting are higher. We also find that countries with higher gender equality have more companies with boards of directors with at least three women. We control for other variables that affect differences among countries and differences in CSR reporting as found in previous studies: cultural differences, law enforcement, GDP, industry and regulation. Our paper contributes to the literature by studying the relationship between board gender composition and CSR reporting. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.