Tamed Transparency: How Information Disclosure under the Global Reporting Initiative Fails to Empower

Klaus Dingwerth and Margot Eichinger
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Klaus Dingwerth: Klaus Dingwerth is Assistant Professor of international relations at the University of Bremen, Germany and a Senior Research Fellow with the international Global Governance Project ( glogov.org ). He is the author of the monograph The New Transnationalism: Transnational Governance and Democratic Legitimacy (2007). Recent articles include "Private Transnational Governance and the Developing World: A Comparative Perspective" (International Studies Quarterly 52 (3)); "World Politics and Organizational Fields: The Case of Transnational Sustainability Regulation" (European Journal of International Relations 15 (4), with Philipp Pattberg); and "Global Governance as a Perspective on World Politics" (Global Governance 12 (2), with Philipp Pattberg).
Margot Eichinger: Margot Eichinger is a graduate student at the University of Bremen and at the Jacobs University Bremen, Germany.

Global Environmental Politics, 2010, vol. 10, issue 3, 74-96

Abstract: In this contribution, we explore the tensions that seem inherent in the claim that transparency policies "empower" the users of disclosed information vis-àvis those who are asked to provide the information. Since these tensions are particularly relevant in relation to voluntary disclosure, our analysis focuses on the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) as the world's leading voluntary corporate non-financial reporting scheme. Corporate sustainability reporting is often hailed as a powerful instrument to improve the environmental performance of business and to empower societal groups, including consumers, in their relations with the corporate world. Yet, our analysis illustrates that the relationship between transparency and empowerment is conflictual at all four levels of activity examined in this article: in the rhetoric and policies of the GRI as well as in the actual reporting practice and in the activities of intermediaries in response to the organization's disclosure standard. (c) 2010 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Date: 2010
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