Emerging phenomenon of corporate social and environmental reporting in China

Shengli Yu · Anna Rowe

42 citations0/0 files storedSustainability Accounting Management and Policy Journal

No readable copy stored yet — this record is metadata only.

No open-access location is known for this record yet.

Literature note Cite in a project Citation map

Corporate Social Responsibility Reporting Auditing, Earnings Management, Governance Accounting and Financial Management

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the motivations underpinning recent evolving corporate social and environmental reporting (CSER) among enterprises in China through the lenses of senior managers. Design/methodology/approach Using the interpretive tenets of engagement research, semi-structured in-depth interviews were adopted to explore the perceptions of senior managers from 21 large companies in various industries. The aim is to make sense of the emerging CSER phenomenon occurring in the field through engagement, observation and penetrating interviews. Findings The findings identify the main enablers driving CSER in China as: regulations and government influence; management awareness; benefits to company image; peer pressure/reporting by peers and public pressure on controversial companies. Guided by a system-based theoretical framework in terms of motivations for CSER, this study offers insights into the effectiveness of using widely adopted Western-based theoretical approaches in a Chinese context where companies operate against a different socio-economic, political, regulatory and cultural backdrop. Research limitations/implications The deep-rooted face (Mianzi) culture has the potential to influence managers to portray a positive image about their companies and themselves. Originality/value This engagement-based study is one of the few initiatives exploring managerial perceptions of CSER in China that adds to the scant literature pertaining to rich “emic” data in accounting, encompassing cultural influence by applying systems-oriented theoretical framework. The stimulus for CSER identified are useful for regulators and organizations to better comprehend how to set effective policies that promote CSER and fit the distinctive institutional characteristics of China.

Paper brief

Loading…

Cite this work

Citation unavailable for this work.

BibTeX RIS CSL-JSON

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Citations in this library

Citation map →

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 42 citations exist upstream.

References

1968The Discovery of Grounded Theory: Strategies for Qualitative Research.1985Naturalistic inquiry 1998Basics of qualitative research : techniques and procedures for developing grounded theory 1983The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields 1977Institutionalized Organizations: Formal Structure as Myth and Ceremony 2004The iron cage revisited institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields 1990Qualitative evaluation and research methods 2003Research Methods for Business Students

Explore the map →

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.

Imported from OpenAlex (CC0) — nothing here is generated.