Corporate Responsibility Communication Research Articles

Corporate Responsibility Communication and Score Trends: A Buyer and Supplier Perspective

The growth of corporate responsibility initiatives continues as firms are facing increasing pressure from stakeholders. This study aims to analyze what factors in corporate responsibility communication impact the value creation for a focal buying firm. Monthly corporate responsibility reports and corporate responsibility scores were collected from twelve chemical and pharmaceutical manufacturing firms active in sustainable procurement initiatives. Sentiment analysis was utilized via the Harvard General Inquirer lexicon that connects syntactic, practical, and semantic information to determine the sentiment polarity for the classification document. Topic classification through multiple supervised machine learning algorithms and comparisons was conducted for buyer and supplier dyads to determine topic classification alignment. Initial propositions are developed indicating the role of focal firm communication strategy as well as sentiment alignment between buyer and suppliers' corporate responsibility communications on a focal buying firm's corporate responsibility performance. We propose communication sentiment tends to follow the corporate responsibility score trends in firms. Additionally, buying firms with suppliers who also advocate positive sentiment toward corporate responsibility tend to have greater growth in corporate responsibility scores indicating the importance of positive consumer corporate responsibility communication. This study extends knowledge of corporate responsibility communication and proposes that alignment in sentiment between the buyer and supplier enhances corporate responsibility. We also propose alignment in corporate responsibility topics among buyer and supplier dyads do not necessarily influence performance in the same way as sentiment.

The responsibility of an ethnocentric consumer – nationalistic, patriotic or environmentally conscientious? A critical discourse analysis of “buy domestic” campaigns

PurposeThe study examines the responsibilisation of an ethnocentric consumer in commercial, meta-organisational discourses. In addition to nationalistic and patriotic discourses, the focus is on wider conceptualisations of consumer responsibility.Design/methodology/approachThe paper uses critical discourse analysis as a methodological approach to conduct an empirical case study on the texts of two producer-driven labelling campaigns.FindingsThe campaign texts create possibilities for ethnocentric consumption with positioning, argumentative and classificatory discourses. Patriotic responsibilisation is emphasised, together with rationales to take action on environmental concerns.Practical implicationsThe study highlights the responsibility of marketers over their corporate responsibility communication, suggesting that ethnocentric promotions may have the power to alter how consumers take action on various responsibility concerns.Social implicationsThe study surfaces the tensions that responsible consumption can entail for consumers. Indeed, nationalistic and patriotic discourses may alter our understanding of responsibility issues that may seem completely separate from the concepts of nationalism and patriotism.Originality/valueThe paper shows how different organisational texts are deployed to bring about the idea of ethnocentric consumption and how this relates to responsibility discourses, nationalism and patriotism.

Customers’ judgments and misjudgments of corporate responsibility communication: A cross‐country investigation of the effects on confidence and trust within the banking sector

AbstractCustomers’ judgment of corporate responsibility (CR) communication and the effect on confidence and trust as interlinked paradigms are intriguing areas of investigation from both theoretical and empirical perspectives. This research aims to clarify the nature of effective CR communication toward customers by identifying situations of over‐ and undercommunication of CR that might cause misjudgments and therefore lower the level of confidence among customers. The study also provides insights to better explain the link between confidence and trust related to customers’ perceptions of CR communication and compares different judgments and misjudgments regarding the banking industries in Italy and the United Kingdom. The study adopts real and fictitious bank case studies to conduct focus groups investigations of 160 millennial customers’ perceptions of CR communication and how it affects their level of confidence. The findings highlight the role of trust in making independent judgments on CR communications. Some similarities and slight differences in the impact of CR communication on confidence emerge between the countries and greatly depend on the customers’ level of trust in real banks and the influence of the industry effect characterizing the banking sector. This study provides fertile ground for future research into the implementation of a more effective and balanced CR communication strategy to increase customers’ confidence and into the understanding of which communication drivers, apparently independent of CR, affect trust in the long term.

A conceptual foundation for expectations of corporate responsibility

PurposeAbility to identify and meet stakeholder expectations is seen as imperative for succeeding in corporate responsibility (CR). However, the existing literature of CR communication treats expectations predominantly as positive constructions. The purpose of this paper is to address this positivity bias and offer insights for a more profound conceptual and empirical understanding of stakeholder expectations.Design/methodology/approachThe paper presents findings from a targeted literature search and empirical illustrations from a thematic analysis of interview data with a focus on the media sector.FindingsThe conceptual understanding of expectations is advanced by exploring positive (optimistic and hopeful) and negative (cynical and pessimistic) expectations. The empirical examples portray expectation analysis and how it becomes more complex when expectations turn negative.Research limitations/implicationsThe data are limited to one sector but implications are discussed with a wider lens to aid future studies in addressing expectations of CR with less positivity bias and, instead, with more conceptual and empirical precision.Practical implicationsThe identification of different expectation types can help practitioners to map and analyze stakeholder expectations of CR, assess interlinking between positive and negative issues, and address stakeholder criticism in a meaningful way.Social implicationsA more precise understanding of stakeholder expectations has the potential to make organizations more sensitive to their societal context, especially concerning CR as social connectedness.Originality/valueThe paper addresses a gap in current literature concerning the positivity bias of expectations and offers conceptual and empirical tools for future research and practice.

Organising Corporate Responsibility Communication Through Filtration: A Study of Web Communication Patterns in Swedish Retail

Corporate responsibility (CR) communication has risen dramatically in recent years, following increased demands for transparency. One tendency noted in the literature is that CR communication is organised and structured. Corporations tend to professionalise CR communication in the sense that they provide information that corresponds to demands for transparency that are voiced by certain stakeholders. This also means that experts within the firm tend to communicate with professional stakeholders outside the firm. In this article, a particular aspect of the organisation of CR communication is examined, a phenomenon that we refer to as the ‘filtration effect’. By comparing CR communication in parent companies and their subsidiaries, we show empirically that there is considerably less CR communication on the subsidiary level compared to the parent level. We see filtration as a sign of conscious organising of CR communication that implies particular attention to certain stakeholder groups with clearly defined demands and expectations on companies. The strong filtration effect noted in the study suggests that CR communication does not seem to be very much adapted to customers, which may be problematic both from a communicative and ethical perspective. The study covers Sweden’s 206 largest retail firms.