Voluntary disclosure of negative information in corporate communication: Can companies benefit from disclosing their ethical infractions?

Aktar, Ipek

Voluntary disclosure of negative information in corporate communication: Can companies benefit from disclosing their ethical infractions?

Document Type

Doctoral thesis
Published Version

Author

Aktar, Ipek

Director

Le Menestrel, Marc

Publication Date

2011-03-21

Pages

215 p.

Citation

Aktar, I. Voluntary disclosure of negative information in corporate communication: Can companies benefit from disclosing their ethical infractions?. Universitat Pompeu Fabra; 2011. handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10803/31883

This citation was generated automatically.

Doctoral program

Programa de doctorat en Economia, Finances i Empresa

Abstract

This thesis builds on the literature of corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication. The following three chapters study the potential impacts of disclosing voluntarily negative information in a company’s own CSR communication within the contexts of pharmaceutical, textile and chocolate companies, respectively. Incorporating survey and experimental methodologies, these studies aim to help identify effective solutions for ethical issues by revealing the appropriate contexts in which companies can discuss them transparently and, thus, be rewarded for responding and acting in good faith and due diligence. Our results suggest that companies might benefit from voluntary disclosure of ethical issues if they also intend to disclose their specific actions for eliminating such infractions. Additionally, we highlight the role of public awareness in how negative information by the relevant stakeholders is evaluated. These studies reinforce the concept that acknowledging ethical issues would lead to higher levels of ethical behavior in business.
La siguiente tesis se basa en la literatura sobre comunicación de responsabilidad social corporativa (RSC) de empresa. Se analizan los posibles efectos de divulgación voluntaria de información negativa en la comunicación (RSC) en contextos de empresas farmacéuticas, textiles y de chocolate. Estos estudios tienen como objetivo ayudar a identificar soluciones efectivas a cuestiones éticas al revelar los contextos donde las empresas puedan debatir de manera transparente, y ser recompensadas por responder y actuar de buena fe y con diligencia. Los resultados sugieren que las empresas pueden beneficiarse de la divulgación voluntaria de aspectos éticos negativos si también divulgan sus acciones específicas para la eliminación de tales infracciones. Además, se destaca el papel de la sensibilización del público sobre como la información negativa se evalúa por las partes interesadas. Estos estudios refuerzan la idea de que reconocer problemas éticos conduce a niveles más altos de comportamiento ético en el mundo empresarial.

Keywords

Corporate Social Responsibility, Corporate Social Disclosure, Voluntary Disclosure of Negative Information, Ethical Consumerism, Public Awareness, Responsabilidad Social Corporativa, Divulgación Social de la Empresa, El consumismo ético, Disposición a Pagar, transparencia