Rhetoric and argument in social and environmental reporting: the Dirty Laundry case
Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal
ISSN: 0951-3574
Article publication date: 29 April 2014
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the interactive element in social and environmental reporting during a controversy between business organisations and a stakeholder over environmental performance.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper adopts Aristotle's triangular framework of the rhetorical situation to examine how the writer, the audience, and the purpose of communication interact in the choice of rhetorical strategies used to persuade others of the validity and legitimacy of a claim during a public controversy. The analysis focuses on the strategies (i.e. moves and their rhetorical realisations) in the form of logos (appealing to logic), ethos (appealing to authority), and pathos (appealing to emotion), with a particular emphasis on metaphor, used to achieve social and political goals. The authors base the analysis on a case study involving a conflict between Greenpeace and six organisations in the sportswear/fashion industry over wastewater discharge of hazardous chemicals. The conflict played out in a series of 20 press releases issued by the parties over a two-month period.
Findings
All six firms interacting with Greenpeace in the form of press releases eventually conceded to Greenpeace's demand to eliminate hazardous chemicals from their supply chains. The paper attributes this to Greenpeace's ability to harness support from other key stakeholders and to use rhetoric effectively. Results show the extensive use of rhetoric by all parties.
Originality/value
The authors regard legitimacy construction as reliant on communication and as being achieved by organisations participating in a dialogue with stakeholders. For this purpose, the paper develops an analytical framework which situates environmental reporting in a specific rhetorical situation and links rhetoric, argument, and metaphor.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
An earlier draft of the paper was written while Doris M. Merkl-Davies was a Visiting Scholar at the University of Sydney Business School whose support the authors gratefully acknowledge. The authors also thank participants at the following conferences/seminars for helpful comments on earlier drafts of the paper: British Accounting & Finance Association 2012; Irish Accounting & Finance Association 2012; Accounting & Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand 2012; University of Exeter; Newcastle Business School, Northumbria University; University of Victoria, Melbourne; University of Canterbury at Christchurch, University of Bristol, Edinburgh University. The authors thank Annika Beelitz for her preparation of Figure 1 in the paper.
Citation
M. Brennan, N. and M. Merkl-Davies, D. (2014), "Rhetoric and argument in social and environmental reporting: the Dirty Laundry case", Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 27 No. 4, pp. 602-633. https://doi.org/10.1108/AAAJ-04-2013-1333
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2014, Emerald Group Publishing Limited