Financial system effectson social and environmental disclosureby companies in emerging and developed countries

Abstract

The study evaluates the influence of financial systems in Australia, Brazil, Canada and India on the extent of corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure in environmentally sensitive industries. In order to achieve this goal, companies from the utility, materials and oil and gas operations were selected from the Forbes 2000 list published in 2008. The period studied ranged from 2007 to 2014. The dependent variable of research is the extent of disclosure of CSR information measured by three dimensions: environmental, social, and total. The independent variables are related to the financial system, as well as control variables relating to firm’s characteristics (size and adoption of the GRI guidelines).These variables came from databases of the World Bank, the World Economic Forum, and from the Australian, Brazilian, Canadian and Indian Stock Exchanges, besides the existing information annual and sustainability reports. The analyses weredescriptive statistics, ANOVA and linear regression. The results indicate that the extent of CSR disclosure is positively related to the financial system. The study concludes that that in countries where companies capture financial resources from stock market, managers should pay attention to the institutional environment to establishing their socioenvironmental disclosure strategies.