Corporate Sustainability Issues Research Articles

The Impact of Family Determinants on the Media Coverage of Family Business Activism in Sustainability

ABSTRACTMedia coverage is a key factor in increasing the flow and accessibility of information among the firm's stakeholders. Drawing on the socioemotional wealth (SEW) perspective, we investigate the antecedents of the level of media coverage of family firms' activism in sustainability. Using hand‐collected data from a sample of public Italian family firms, we provide several novel contributions to the academic debate. First, we find that family involvement on the board of directors is negatively associated with the level of media coverage of the family firm's engagement in sustainability. Conversely, we find that later generational stages of the family business are positively associated with the level of corporate media coverage on sustainability. Our study advances the literature on both corporate sustainability issues and media coverage in the context of family businesses.

The Role of Environmental Uncertainty, Firm Size, and Enterprise Risk Management to Improve Firm Performance

Global warming and other environmental problems are a major concern because related to corporate sustainability issues, so research is needed regarding various factors that influence company performance. This quantitative research was conducted to determine and analyze the influence of environmental uncertainty, firm size, and enterprise risk management on firm performance. The population in this study is the energy sector listed on Bursa Malaysia during 2017-2021. The sample selection used the purposive sampling method. Hypothesis testing using panel data regression with the E-Views 12. The results of this study show that, (1) environmental uncertainty has no effect on firm performance, (2) firm size has a positive effect on firm performance, (3) enterprise risk management has a positive effect on firm performance

Shareholder Proposals and Sustainability: An Empirically-Based Critical Reflection

Abstract 276 Publicly traded companies face growing scrutiny in respect of their sustainability strategies and policies from regulators, the general public, NGOs, as well as investors. One area where the attention for corporate sustainability issues has materialised is at the general meetings of these companies, including in the form of a growing number of shareholder proposals on environmental and social topics. Against the background of this development, I have investigated sustainability-related shareholder proposals in 25 countries. More specifically, this paper presents the results of a survey of shareholder proposals on environmental and social topics that have been put to a vote in the period between 2020 and 2022, with the aim of exploring what sustainability issues are addressed through shareholder proposals, who submit E&S-related shareholder proposals, and which sectors are subjected to such proposals. During this three-year period, nearly one-third of the 1995 shareholder proposal that have been identified directly related to environmental and social issues. The investigation reveals that the majority of such proposals have been submitted by individuals, organisations with primarily social objectives, and SRI asset managers and investment advisors. But in light of increasing attention, both in society and in investor circles, for what institutional investors are doing to support and promote sustainability strategies and policies of publicly traded companies, in particular when it comes to climate change, it may be the case that (some of) these investors will increasingly exercise agenda-setting rights in connection with corporate sustainability issues. 277

Sustainable Development and Corporate Sustainability of Chilean State Universities: Evidence from Their Strategic Elements

Corporate sustainability evolved in line with the advancement of the concept of sustainable development; thus, it is constituted as a strategy to respond to social and environmental problems. In this context, universities are understood as complex organizations, positioned as a key mechanism for delivering the sustainable development of society. This research aimed to analyze whether the strategic elements of Chilean state universities integrate components of sustainable development. For this purpose, qualitative research was undertaken through a documentary analysis of the strategic plans of the 18 Chilean state universities, focusing analysis on their strategic elements: their mission, vision and strategic institutional objectives. The results revealed that all universities mention at least one concept associated with one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in their strategic guidelines. They mainly focused on ‘Quality Education’ (SDG 4) and ‘Build resilient infrastructure, promoting inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation’ (SDG 9). Also, the results allow us to visualize how universities address corporate sustainability issues through their strategic plans.

Balancing global corporate sustainability engagement in asymmetric markets: The Coca-Cola Co. case

Motivated by the changes in the understanding and the growing importance of sustainability engagement among companies, investors, and societies, this paper has for objective to understand how a multinational corporation adjusts its sustainability engagement to different cultures, institutions, and market realities as this topic becomes imperative through the triad Environment, Social, and Governance (ESG) responsibilities. To that end, a qualitative case study of The Coca-Cola Company was used as the basis for this research. The methodology chosen supported the analysis of a situation where an international company operating in different markets must implement a balanced approach in order to fulfill its asymmetries. One important finding was that ESG implementation depends on local resources, which may lead to further asymmetries instead of increased global balance. Another result presented is a model that helps identify essential corporate sustainability issues for defining the strategies, targets, and plans for global, local, and individual levels that may be used by researchers and practitioners alike. This model shall be refined and improved by future research with other organizations that operate globally and must adjust their corporate sustainability strategy according to the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals while using local implementation strategies aligned with the national institutional realities of the different countries.

Analyzing the Concept of Corporate Sustainability in the Context of Sustainable Business Development in the Mining Sector with Elements of Circular Economy

Promoting the concept and principles of sustainable development at the micro level requires that industrial companies understand and improve approaches to managing corporate sustainability. Currently, economics does not provide a universal definition of what corporate sustainability is. With regard to the mining sector, corporate sustainability issues reflecting the viability, value, and sustainable development potential of companies have not yet been studied extensively. The article discusses the conceptual foundations of corporate sustainability; the characteristics and a classification of approaches to defining corporate sustainability; and the relationship between corporate sustainability, sustainable development at the micro level, and circular economy. By analyzing the example of Russia, the influence of the mining industry on the environmental, economic, and social development of both a country with a resource-based economy and individual mining regions is shown from the viewpoint of sustainability. The distinguishing features of mining companies, which include natural capital and mineral assets, are studied in the context of promoting corporate sustainability. It is proven that the effective corporate management of ESG factors results in environmental and social influence that goes in line with sustainable development requirements and serves as a foundation for corporate sustainability. A refined definition of corporate sustainability has been formulated, the specific features of corporate sustainability management in mining companies have been determined, and the specific features of corporate social responsibility have been studied. The issue of integrating circular economy elements into the corporate sustainability concept is discussed, and it is claimed that the inclusion of circular business models in the corporate strategies of mining companies will contribute to their corporate sustainable development and boost their contribution to the achievement of sustainable development goals.

Identifying the moral–practical gaps in corporate social responsibility missions of Vietnamese firms: An event‐based analysis of sustainability feasibility

AbstractThis research aims to improve stakeholder engagement, particularly local businesses, in addressing environmental problems and taking on both ecological conservation and social responsibilities. A structured dataset was built to track all major environment‐related events in Vietnam. Findings, which were extracted from 344 news reports and 75 environmental events, highlight the lack of participation on Vietnamese businesses in sustainable development, with existing corporate activities still driven by practical concerns, that is, profitability. Notably, a minimum of one governmental agency was involved in 82.6% of the events categorized as environmentally damaging, with investigative or administrative tasks being their dominant role. Going forward, there is a need for systematic information collection and public disclosure on business and government involvements in environmental events. Given that Vietnam is expected to be hard hit by climate change, a better understanding of corporate sustainability issues would be beneficial to both the firms and society in the long run.

Identifying Corporate Sustainability Issues by Analyzing Shareholder Resolutions: A Machine-Learning Text Analytics Approach

Corporations have embraced the idea of corporate environmental, social, and governance (ESG) under the general framework of sustainability. Studies have measured and analyzed the impact of internal sustainability efforts on the performance of individual companies, policies, and projects. This exploratory study attempts to extract useful insight from shareholder sustainability resolutions using machine learning-based text analytics. Prior research has studied corporate sustainability disclosures from public reports. By studying shareholder resolutions, we gain insight into the shareholders’ perspectives and objectives. The primary source for this study is the Ceres sustainability shareholder resolution database, with 1737 records spanning 2009–2019. The study utilizes a combination of text analytic approaches (i.e., word cloud, co-occurrence, row-similarities, clustering, classification, etc.) to extract insights. These are novel methods of transforming textual data into useful knowledge about corporate sustainability endeavors. This study demonstrates that stakeholders, such as shareholders, can influence corporate sustainability via resolutions. The incorporation of text analytic techniques offers insight to researchers who study vast collections of unstructured bodies of text, improving the understanding of shareholder resolutions and reaching a wider audience.

The process of selecting and prioritising corporate sustainability issues: Insights for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals

The Sustainable Development Goals are a set of 17 wide ranging goals that articulates the desired outcome of sustainable development. The private sector is a key factor in achieving these goals through actions of corporate sustainability. However, there is a paucity of research regarding the application of Sustainable Development Goals at the firm level and it remains unclear how the private sector can operationalise and achieve the goals through corporate sustainability. While every Sustainable Development Goal is deemed of equal importance, it is up to individual firms to interpret and prioritise their implementation. Using a case study approach, this paper identified the specific goals considered by Japanese manufacturing multinational enterprises as a priority when establishing or significantly expanding operations in developing countries. The methodology employed allowed the retrospective analysis of corporate sustainability data through a Sustainable Development Goal lens. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were carried out with 58 respondents from 16 sample firms operating in the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam. The results show the multinational enterprises in the sample focus on a particular set of Sustainable Development Goals when establishing, or significantly expanding, subsidiary operations in the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam. The findings show policy makers in the host countries should ensure Sustainable Development Goals such as education and strong institutions are in place to attract multinational enterprises to their shores. Other stakeholders such as non-governmental organisations and the community were also seen to influence the prioritisation of certain goals considered by firms.

A holistic perspective on corporate sustainability from a management viewpoint: Evidence from Japanese manufacturing multinational enterprises

This study investigates what issues are considered by Japanese manufacturing multinational enterprises to be related to corporate sustainability when deciding on the location or significant expansion of their subsidiaries. Focusing on the developing countries of the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam where there are significant Japanese manufacturing activities in an environmentally sensitive region, in-depth interviews were carried out with 58 representatives from 16 Japanese manufacturing multinational enterprises. Results identify that these multinational enterprises considered four main issue areas including the environment (waste material/water; air pollution; water supply; noise; green procurement), host country employment (size of workforce; above minimum wages; rights to association; women employment/empowerment; worker safety), workforce quality (experience/training; local employment) and local consumer benefits (product benefits/impact on lifestyle) as being related to corporate sustainability issues beyond purely commercial drivers. Host country regulations had a notable impact on the issues considered by the multinational enterprises, although some voluntarily moved beyond what was required albeit in a minimal way. These findings address a paucity of studies examining a holistic perspective on sustainability, with previous research on Japanese multinationals tending to adopt an anthropocentric focus. In doing so, with a greater insight into what issues are considered to be corporate sustainability from the multinational enterprises’ viewpoint, this research has important implications in informing host country governments developing their policies and regulations to ensure relevant corporate sustainability issues are included.

Shareholder Sustainability Activism in the Netherlands

Corporations play a crucial role in achieving a sustainable world. In achieving corporate sustainability, the current regulatory frameworks generally emphasize the role of the corporate board, but today’s media suggest that institutional investors are becoming more involved. In this study, we explore the actual role of shareholders as an important class of corporate actors in promoting corporate sustainability in the Netherlands. It is common practice for Dutch companies to disclose full transcripts of their meetings on their websites, including shareholder questions. We studied shareholder activism on corporate sustainability in 763 AGMs of Dutch listed companies and found that, despite the lack of mandatory regulation and the use of shareholder proposals, shareholders in the Netherlands, including institutional investors, seem to increasingly care about corporate sustainability issues. We found that the share of questions and remarks of institutional investors related to corporate sustainability matters increased from close to two percent in 2004 to over twenty percent in 2017. Taking into account the large variety of topics shareholders may ask questions about, including remuneration matters, the corporate strategy, board elections, dividend policies, auditing, and so on, twenty percent is substantial. Despite the increasing interest of institutional investors regarding corporate sustainability matters, institutional investors’ use of the forum right in AGMs is still low. Since these investors and larger shareholders often make use of other, private activist tools, further research as to whether the use of other shareholder tools for advocating corporate sustainability goals has increased too is important.

AN INVESTIGATION OF INTERCONNECTION BETWEEN BUSINESS EXCELLENCE MODELS AND CORPORATE SUSTAINABILITY APPROACH

The paper provides a general approach to explore the suitability of business excellence models (BEMs) to include corporate sustainability (CS) and on examples of awarded organizations in national quality awards (NQAs) found the synergic approach in deploying issues of BEMs and sustainability. The aim of the paper is to provide an overview of the BEMs approach in the Czech Republic and found the relevance with the issues of corporate sustainability. As an example was involved the Czech organizations awarded in NQAs in the area of excellence and sustainability in 2016. Based on a reflection of the current situation, there is a clear lack of organizations' approach to principles or strategic management tools that are suitable for implementation to enhance organization excellence including corporate sustainability. Then, an analysis is deployed in order to identify common synergy between BEMs and issues of corporate sustainability. This study is based on information gathered through an extensive literature review using print media and research databases like Emerald, EBSCO, Pro-Quest and we also employed the available sustainable reporting for awarded companies. The study is expected to help in reviewing national business excellence strategies and overview of the collected samples of organizations may help other entities to effectively process reports to use of the synergy of the criteria of the BEMs and corporate sustainability within the relevant NQAs or to target on appropriate stakeholders. Keywords: corporate sustainability, business excellence models, National Quality Awards, EFQM excellence model

Impact of gender diversity on social and environmental performance: evidence from Malaysia

PurposeThis study is guided by the upper echelon theory and argues that the role of females on boards of directors may differ between cultures. In a culture where the community has a significant humane orientation, female directors may pay much more attention to the social issues of corporate sustainability rather than environmental issues. Therefore, this study aims to differentiate between the social and environmental performances of companies to examine whether the presence of females on the boards of directors of Malaysian firms could affect social and environmental performances differently.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses a sample of firms listed in Bursa Malaysia and develops two disclosure indices to measure social and environmental performances. Three proxies of female directors are used in the empirical models. The ordinary least square model is used to test the hypothesis.FindingsThe empirical results suggest a positive association between social performance and the presence of female directors on the board of directors of Malaysian firms. However, no association was found between environmental performance and the presence of female directors on those boards. These results confirm the prediction of this study that the female directors of Malaysian firms pay more attention to social issues than to environmental ones.Originality/valueThis is the first study to examine the effects of the presence of female directors on Malaysian firms’ boards of directors on social and environmental performance. It also contributes to the upper echelon theory by illuminating the importance of gender diversity in influencing the social and environmental behaviors of corporate leaders. The results provide the important implication that the association between a firm’s social and environmental performance and gender diversity depends on the culture within which the company operates.

The challenging transition to bio-economies: Towards a new framework integrating corporate sustainability and value co-creation

The transition to equitable and sustainable societies has become even more important for both scholars and managers. Bio-economies are based on renewable resources to build an economic system to be sustainably implemented to ensure cleaner, safer production and consumption, building on innovation; the main driver of firm success especially today.Considering sustainability which can lead to bio-economy, it is clear that social and economic aspects cannot be separated from each other. Therefore, also new firm practices and/or approaches are needed, able to encompass corporate sustainability issues and dimensions - social, economic, environmental, and time - as key issues, without forgetting the primary role of innovation. Past studies have proposed a new approach in the field of firm practices oriented to corporate sustainability. The present paper aims at making a step forward in this direction considering the value co-creation approach following a strategic perspective for the first time and putting forward a new framework explicitly integrating the key features of the recently proposed “Sustainability Oriented Theory of the Firm” into the value co-creation approach. Indeed, the proposed framework is able to show how the four dimensions of corporate sustainability can be fully encompassed in a model of value co-creation built around both innovation and the key features - inclusivity, generativity, linkability and evolvability - to start the co-creation movement on behalf the entire society and not only on behalf the firm goals. The proposed framework is therefore able to suggest to firms how to simultaneously manage value co-creation processes, corporate sustainability, and by this way contribute to bio-economies.

Strategic interpretation on sustainability issues – eliciting cognitive maps of boards of directors

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the role of cognitive diversity on strategic issue interpretation among the boards of directors making sense of sustainability management. The study also investigated the centrality of the corporate sustainability issues to identify common interpretative patterns in the shared cognitive maps among the companies. In addition, the aim was to advance quantitative methods for the analysis of decision-makers’ cognition.Design/methodology/approachThe research was an exploratory study analyzing 43 individual cognitive maps collected through surveys from the boards of nine cleantech companies. For the elicitation of the cognitive maps, the study used the hybrid cognitive mapping technique. The diversity of the shared cognitive maps was analyzed using the distance ratio formula and the graph analysis method with eigenvector to measure the centrality of the strategic issue interpretation in the maps.FindingsThis study provides evidence through the analysis of distance ratios on the existence of cognitive diversity among companies within the same industry. Surprisingly, despite the cognitive diversity, the study identified strong common patterns on strategic issue interpretations among the companies. In addition, the study shows that the sustainability management issues have gained minor attention from the boards of directors.Research limitations/implicationsThe initial industry sample provided relatively restricted perspectives on managerial cognition, and to confirm the findings regarding the effects of industry on the shared cognitive maps of top decision-makers, wider industry-level data are needed.Practical implicationsThis study provides an approach to facilitate the process of strategic decision-making for top decision-makers by identifying the shared beliefs of the selected strategic theme and to concentrate on the most central strategic issues in the company and industry. It reveals asymmetry between the significance of sustainability issues in an open agenda and the real position of sustainability concepts in the shared cognitive maps in the green industry. Also, the study advances cognitive mapping techniques for application in the board’s decision-making.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to brightening the black box of corporate governance by shedding light on the interaction of the concepts of corporate sustainability and other key strategic issues within the shared cognitive maps of the boards. It also provides new empirical knowledge on top decision-making processes and the effects of cognitive diversity on the strategic issue interpretations within the corporate boards of the green industry, and it further develops the methodology for the quantification of cognitive diversity and the content of cognitive maps.

Reflexivity in Sustainability Accounting and Management: Transcending the Economic Focus of Corporate Sustainability

In order to enable firms to successfully deal with issues of corporate sustainability, the firms' stakeholders would need to participate in sustainability accounting and management. In practice, however, participative sustainability accounting and management are often unfeasible. The resulting consequence is the risk of misbalancing single aspects of sustainability. The purpose of this article is to show that reflexivity in sustainability accounting and management, that is, an ongoing reflection on the relationship between the goals of corporate sustainability and the overarching objective of sustainable development can, at least, mitigate this problem. Reflexivity has the potential to initiate processes of collective learning and could eventually bring about the realization of business models that integrate economic, ecological, and social considerations.

Individual and Organizational Responses to Changing and Challenging Conditions

In this issue, we introduce three empirical articles, all of which concern our changing organizational environment. We take up the issues of corporate sustainability, organizational downsizing, and...

Key challenges facing the SRI indices development in China

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to map out the soft and hard infrastructures that may have contribute to the SRI indices development in China. As part of the research, the author particularly focuses on the governance, reporting and transparency of corporate sustainability issues in China.Design/methodology/approach – The author reviewed literature, new articles, research reports and documents of the two stock exchanges, Shanghai Stock Exchange and Shenzhen Stock Exchange, in China, to understand the current SRI development and the challenges and opportunities for SRI indices in the market.Findings – The major findings from this paper are four‐fold. First, as the government's influence in the market is still substantial, government leadership in promoting corporate sustainability and SRI is essential in China. Second, with the stock exchanges already taking a proactive role in corporate sustainability with the stringent listing regulations, they are the natural facilitators in having SRI indices an...

Towards corporate sustainability: Equitable wealth allocation to all participating stakeholders

In the corporate and academic worlds, issues regarding corporate sustainability have become much pronounced. To sustain future business activities, corporations are advised to adhere to good corporate governance where they have to focus on social and environmental elements, apart from their economic aspirations. This is a new phenomenon in business as many corporations tend to focus their attention on the allocation of corporate wealth mainly to shareholders through the maxim of “maximisation of shareholders’ wealth”. The aim of this study is to empirically research on the current practices that corporations deploy and report the results in a scientific manner. Although at a transitional stage, the results indicate that corporations in Africa attend to issues of corporate sustainability through allocation of their wealth to many stakeholders that are involved in the wealth creation. To understand the interconnectedness and interdependence of different stakeholders that determine sustainability of any business, a conceptual framework of stakeholder relationships and networks has been developed. The study contributes towards new knowledge about corporate sustainability issues that involve companies in Africa. Key words: Africa, corporate sustainability, governance, Malawi, resource allocation, South Africa, stakeholders, Ubuntu.

Finding Common Ground on the Metrics that Matter

Investors and companies increasingly agree on the key corporate environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues that can affect a company’s financial value. Because, however, traditional accounting metrics fall short in assessing sustainability, there is no agreement on how to measure corporate management of those issues. As a result, investors find it difficult to gather and analyze corporate ESG data, even while companies experience ‘survey fatigue’ from the time and resources required to fulfill data requests from various investors, investor advocates, and others seeking to create their own metrics. This new study provides the first comprehensive analysis of which corporate ESG information is tracked by companies and how it is or is not consistent with analogous information sought by investors, research companies and others. The study, “Finding Common Ground on the Metrics that Matter,” was commissioned and funded by the Investor Responsibility Research Center (IRRC) Institute. Major findings include: 1) There is agreement on key corporate sustainability issues, but not on the metrics used to measure the management of them, nor on the purposes served by examining corporate ESG information; 2) Although ESG metrics routinely are reported on request by substantial percentages of companies, few companies report all the ESG information they collect internally; and 3) ESG researchers, investors, and corporate representatives approach ESG issues from a risk mitigation perspective, not a value creation perspective.