Initiating sustainable development reporting: evidence from New Zealand

Jan Bebbington, Colin Higgins and Bob Frame

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, 2009, vol. 22, issue 4, 588-625

Abstract: Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to document organizations' self descriptions of why they initiated sustainable development (SD) reporting and explore these explanations using an institutional theory framework. Design/methodology/approach - Constructs organizational narratives from semi‐structured in‐depth interviews with reporting champions who participated in an SD reporting workshop series. The narratives are analysed using institutional theory to explore how regulatory, normative and cognitive institutions combine with organizational dynamics to influence SD reporting activity. Findings - For these particular organizations, choosing to engage in reporting appears not to be a rational choice. Rather reporting is initiated because it has come to be an accepted part of pursuing a differentiation strategy, it offers some contribution to existing business challenges, and organizations value the rewards it offers. This rationale constitutes a cognitive mechanism within institutional theory. Originality/value - The paper provides useful information on initiating sustainable development reporting based on organizations' self descriptions.

Keywords: Corporate social responsibility; Sustainable development; Narratives; New Zealand (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (53)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (text/html)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:aaajpp:v:22:y:2009:i:4:p:588-625

DOI: 10.1108/09513570910955452

Access Statistics for this article

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal is currently edited by Prof James Guthrie and Prof Lee Parker

More articles in Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal from Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Emerald Support ().