EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Institutional impacts on corporate social responsibility: a comparative analysis of New Zealand and Pakistan

Majid Khan (), James C. Lockhart () and Ralph J. Bathurst ()
Additional contact information
Majid Khan: Massey University
James C. Lockhart: Massey University
Ralph J. Bathurst: Massey University

International Journal of Corporate Social Responsibility, 2018, vol. 3, issue 1, 1-13

Abstract: Abstract This study explores the relationship between institutional mechanisms and corporate social responsibility (CSR) in both Pakistan and New Zealand. Institutional factors are normally categorised as being either formal or informal. It is argued that a combination of formal institutions and informal institutions in any jurisdiction shape the adoption, or otherwise of CSR by business through its adherence to acceptable governance praxis. Corporate regulation in Pakistan is heavily influenced from elsewhere, especially from British common law. By contrast the institutional realities produce remarkably different outcomes in the two jurisdictions. This study examines which formal and informal institutions influence CSR disclosures, in that businesses disclose CSR practices in response to regulations; cognitive pressures that help people understand and interpret the practice correctly; and, cultural values enforcing the same practice. Quantitative content analyses of a sample of eight listed companies’ annual reports were completed from each country. Reporting and disclosure practices were identified in both. Underlying institutions were then recorded as being recognised, acknowledged or inferred by the respective reporting business. The results highlighted that Pakistani companies disclose more about CSR than those analysed from New Zealand. This result is attributed to the recently developed corporate governance guidelines by the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan. The informal national institutions in both countries also play a vital role in the disparity of disclosures. This is not to suggest that New Zealand listed companies lag behind those in Pakistan with respect to their contribution to CSR initiatives, simply that the disclosure levels between the two favour those companies in Pakistan.

Keywords: Corporate social responsibility; Corporate governance; Regulation; Institutional theory; New Zealand; Pakistan (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7) Track citations by RSS feed

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1186/s40991-018-0026-3 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

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:spr:ijocsr:v:3:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1186_s40991-018-0026-3

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://jcsr.springeropen.com/

DOI: 10.1186/s40991-018-0026-3

Access Statistics for this article

International Journal of Corporate Social Responsibility is currently edited by René Schmidpeter and Samuel O. Idowu

More articles in International Journal of Corporate Social Responsibility from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().

 
Page updated 2023-05-18
Handle: RePEc:spr:ijocsr:v:3:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1186_s40991-018-0026-3