The Effect of Independent Director Reputation Incentives on Corporate Social Responsibility: Evidence from China

Lei Yu, Daojuan Wang and Qi Wang
Additional contact information
Lei Yu: Business School, Southwest University of Political Science and Law, No.301 Baosheng Avenue, Chongqing 401120, China
Daojuan Wang: Department of Business and Management, Aalborg University, Room 52, Fibigerstræde 4, 9220 Aalborg East, Denmark
Qi Wang: Business School, Southwest University of Political Science and Law, No.301 Baosheng Avenue, Chongqing 401120, China

Sustainability, 2018, vol. 10, issue 9, 1-15

Abstract: This paper examines the effect of independent director reputation incentives on corporate social responsibility (CSR). Using an unbalanced panel of 3765 Chinese-listed firms between 2009 and 2014, this study suggests that independent director reputation incentives improve CSR. Furthermore, it is found that this effect is more pronounced in non-state-owned enterprises (non-SOEs) than in state-owned enterprises (SOEs). In addition, our results also show that the effect of independent director reputation incentives on CSR is moderated by firm size, and this effect is much stronger in relatively larger firms. Together, these results suggest that reputation is an effective mechanism that can motivate independent directors to fulfill their role of monitoring and advising CSR, especially in non-SOEs and relatively larger firms. We add new insights to the research on the topics of independent director system, protection of the stakeholders’ interests, and CSR enhancement.

Keywords: independent director reputation incentives; corporate social responsibility; stakeholders’ interests; property ownership; firm size (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/10/9/3302/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/10/9/3302/ (text/html)

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:gam:jsusta:v:10:y:2018:i:9:p:3302-:d:170025

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().