International banks’ CSR disclosures after the 2008 crisis
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to determine the corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure level of 35 international banks across the world at the end of 2013 and analyse the changes in their disclosure patterns compared to 2005 from the institutional perspective.
Design/methodology/approach
Content analysis of international banks’ web-sites and CSR reports.
Findings
As expected, CSR disclosure scores of international banks in 2013 were significantly larger than in 2005. Despite addressing the legitimacy gap after the 2008 crisis, significant room for improvements remained in the context of sustainable products, implementation of environmental management policies and introduction of CSR initiatives (the latter especially for Northern American banks). Although the transnational context had contributed to the gradual convergence of CSR disclosure scores, the existence of differing national and organisational contexts had maintained some of the diversity across banks.
Research limitations/implications
Content analysis approach used limits the possibilities to objectively grasp the depth of CSR and the sample remains biased towards larger international banks headquartered in Europe.
Practical implications
Stakeholders should remain vary of “window-dressing” attempts and reward only those banks that actually contribute to the society.
Social implications
Intergovernmental organisations should continue to develop both new and already existing financial sector CSR initiatives to improve the stability of the global financial sector.
Originality/value
Previous studies have not investigated international banks’ CSR disclosures on broader global samples during the post-2008-crisis period and have not considered the institutional context of their CSR.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful for the financial support provided by the Estonian Ministry of Education and Research to project SF0140059s12 “Economic Fluctuations in Central and Eastern Europe: Causes, Consequences and Challenges”. This paper represents the work conducted in connection with this project. The funding providers had no role in the research process from study design to submission. The authors also appreciate the insightful comments of the two anonymous referees.
Citation
Laidroo, L. and Sokolova, M. (2015), "International banks’ CSR disclosures after the 2008 crisis", Baltic Journal of Management, Vol. 10 No. 3, pp. 270-294. https://doi.org/10.1108/BJM-08-2014-0128
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2015, Emerald Group Publishing Limited