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Environmental Reporting Through an Ethical Looking Glass

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Abstract

This paper adopts the lens of environmental ethics to explore whether there is a disparity between the ethical approaches of a company in comparison to those expressed by stakeholders in relation to environmental issues, specifically those communicated through the corporate environmental report. Discourse analysis is adopted to explore the environmental section of the sustainability reports of the case study company as compared to the responses of a sample of the company’s stakeholders, using the lens of three branches of environmental ethics: utilitarianism, deontology and virtue ethics. Results indicate that the ethical approaches expressed in the case study company’s environmental reports were grounded in utilitarianism and deontology, in contrast to a virtue ethics approach expressed by external stakeholders. The disparity widened as the relationship between the company and the stakeholder became less direct. This disparity signals a failure to meet one of the primary purposes for preparing sustainability reports: to engage with stakeholders. As such this research contributes to the literature by identifying a disparity in the how this information is communicated compared with how it is perceived by stakeholders. This has important implications for the success of current stakeholder engagement practices.

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Notes

  1. Alterity refers to the quality of difference, or otherness. It is a concept frequently drawn from a feminist thought as an alternative to homogeny and universalism, concepts associated with a patriarchal perspective.

  2. The name of the company and any other identifying features have been removed in order to adhere to the guidance provided by the Tasmanian Social Sciences Human Research Ethics Committee.

  3. The name of the specific species of wildlife referred to in the case study company’s environmental report has been removed to protect the identity of the company.

  4. In the context of this case study organisation, the local government is considered to work in alignment with the case study organisation. The case study company operates in an area with high unemployment rates and low levels of development; therefore the local government body is very supportive of industry which can improve the financial prosperity of the local community.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Tasmanian School of Business and Economics, University of Tasmania, Hobart, TAS, Australia

    Leanne Morrison, Trevor Wilmshurst & Sonia Shimeld

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  1. Leanne Morrison
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  2. Trevor Wilmshurst
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  3. Sonia Shimeld
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Correspondence to Leanne Morrison.

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Morrison, L., Wilmshurst, T. & Shimeld, S. Environmental Reporting Through an Ethical Looking Glass. J Bus Ethics 150, 903–918 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-016-3136-4

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