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This paper aims to explore how environmental management practices impact different dimensions of corporate sustainability. It also explores the mediating impact of environmental regulation and reports on the relationship between environmental management practice and corporate sustainability.

A brief focus group discussion and a preliminary test were conducted through a focused group meeting with industry experts before data were collected from senior management of 116 registered operations in the hospitality and tourism industry in the Maldives. To analyse the data, a mediation model is proposed and tested using partial least squares structural equation modelling.

Results showed that environmental management practices have a direct and positive effect on corporate sustainability. Furthermore, environmental regulation and reporting positively mediate the effect of environmental management practices on corporate sustainability. Among the sustainability dimensions, it is important to note that the social sustainability aspect has the highest impact, followed by the economic and environmental aspects of corporate sustainability.

Findings provide empirical evidence in understanding achieving corporate sustainability through environmental management practices. The study is practical for stakeholders and policymakers to follow through with the environmental regulations and be transparent on environmental reporting measures that impact overall sustainability.

This study serves as noteworthy research for stakeholders to evaluate against regulatory and reporting requirements for businesses they invest in the future. It adds value to the literature and attempts to advance environmental management and sustainability research in the context of small island developing states.

Contemporary frameworks on institutional theory and corporate environmentalism observe that institutional fields positively influence a firm’s environmental response in the form of implementation of environmental practices. These frameworks, however, provide little evidence on why firms facing similar institutional field differ in their environmental response. This paper aims to incorporate the intra-organizational dynamics within the traditional institutional theory framework to address this heterogeneity, examining specifically the role of absorptive capacity for environmental knowledge in the organizational implementation of corporate environmental practices.

Integrating the institutional theory and resource-based view, this paper examines the mediating role of absorptive capacity in the relationship between institutional pressure for corporate environmentalism vis-a-vis the implementation of corporate environmental practices. Partial least square structural equation modeling was used for hypotheses testing based on data obtained from the Indian apparel and textile industry.

The results support the mediating role of absorptive capacity in the relationship between institutional pressure and implementation of corporate environmental practices. Further, this study highlights the importance of acquisition and utilization of environmental knowledge in driving environmentalism through developing absorptive capacity; the findings also suggest that the role of institutional pressure in the implementation of environmental practices should not be analyzed in isolation but rather in conjunction with the development of absorptive capacity that forms the internal basis of implementation.

Managers need to focus on the development of organizational capabilities for acquiring and exploiting environmental knowledge to complement their preparedness in responding to any institutional pressures for environmental sustainability. Firms also need to link their environmental orientation with various sources of environmental knowledge and capabilities residing outside the organizational boundaries. It is important to note here that the development of absorptive capacities for the exploration and exploitation of external knowledge is indeed both required and necessary to build sustainable organizational capabilities.

This paper is among the very few studies that address the issue of knowledge and development of related organizational capabilities for corporate environmentalism. Recognizing that environmental knowledge resides outside organizational boundaries with regulatory agencies and special interest groups, this paper highlights the importance of developing organizational capabilities for the acquisition and exploitation of environmental knowledge.

The purpose of this study is to explore the contributing barriers to corporate social and environmental responsibility (CSER) practices. In particular, this study focuses on non-managerial stakeholders’ perceptions of the barriers to CSER practices in a developing country context. The study also investigates the current initiatives undertaken by the different stakeholders, such as government, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and regulators.

The study takes a qualitative approach, undertaking semi-structured in-depth interviews with 26 participants from NGOs, the media, regulatory authorities, government departments, shareholders, trade union leaders and customers.

The views of stakeholder groups were analysed to identify the contributing barriers to CSER practices. The findings of the study reveal that corruption and politics, lack of coordination, lack of government initiatives and unsatisfactory implementation of laws are perceived as the major barriers that hinder CSER practices in Bangladesh. The study also found a lack of awareness amongst various stakeholder groups regarding the influential role CSER plays in promoting sustainable development. The current initiatives undertaken by various stakeholders to improve CSER practices were limited but growing.

The study utilises the stakeholder theory to examine the role of stakeholders, rather than managers, in relation to CSER practice in Bangladesh. The findings may provide impetus for mitigating CSER barriers in a developing country context.

This study is one of the few engagement-based studies to explore the non-managerial stakeholders’ views on CSER in a developing country context.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to develop a framework which sheds new light on how sustainability control systems (SCS) can be used in proactive strategic responses to corporate sustainability pressures.

Design/Methodology/Approach – Corporate sustainability pressures are identified using insights from institutional theory and the resource-based view of the firm.

Findings – The paper presents an integrated framework showing the corporate sustainability pressures, proactive strategic responses to these pressures, and how organizations might use SCS in their responses to the corporate sustainability pressures they face.

Practical Implications – The proposed framework shows how organizations can use SCS in proactive strategic responses to corporate sustainability pressures.

Originality/Value – The paper suggests that instead of using traditional financial-oriented management control systems, organizations need more focus on emerging SCS as a means of achieving sustainability objectives. In particular, the paper proposes different SCS tools that can be used in proactive strategic responses to sustainability pressures in terms of (i) specifying and communicating sustainability objectives, (ii) monitoring sustainability performance, and (iii) providing motivation by linking sustainability rewards to performance.

The objective of this paper is to examine environmental disclosure practices among Malaysian public‐listed companies in an attempt to interpret corporate motivations for their environmental engagements and commitments.

This paper investigates corporate motivations using content analysis by examining the corporate annual reports. Discourse analysis was used to analyse and then interpret the environmental information. In particular, the reasons that have inspired companies in Malaysia to engage in environmental matters are the focus of the research.

The results revealed high levels of information in environmental disclosures concerning current environmental engagements and future environmental plans/strategies. The environmental information was found to contain messages that revealed the corporate motives of certain environmental engagements. Three key motivating factors were found to be: “stakeholders' concern”, “self‐environmental concern” and “operational improvements”.

The paper advocates interpretation of the discourse of environmental information to determine the comprehensive scope on corporate environmental reporting.

Disclosure practices (through the use of language) are utilised by business corporations to articulate messages concerning their environmental engagements and the motives behind such engagements. Furthermore, the paper offers some insights into current environmental reporting practices in a developing country.

During the current century, environmental sustainability and waste reduction processes have always been subject to scrutiny in developed societies. Developed communities have gained considerable momentum by investing in environmental infrastructure and integrating corporate performance disclosure and less developed communities are involved with it. Carbon disclosure is one of the aspects of green accounting in “corporate strategies,” especially those operating across the capital market. Adherence to the disclosure of facts can facilitate sustainable development in societies. This study aims to present strategic reference points matrix-based model to develop a framework for carbon disclosure strategies through institutional and stakeholder pressures throughout the capital market.

As a case study, by reviewing similar research on carbon disclosure, this study seeks to illustrate various carbon disclosure aspects and strategies in a matrix based on institutional (vertical axis) and stakeholder (horizontal axis) pressures

The study attempts to states that carbon disclosure is affected solely by the company because of the presence of agency gaps between external stakeholders and corporate executives.

However, the firm’s decision to adopt a carbon disclosure strategy depends on the performance of stakeholder pressure (stakeholder salience level) and managers’ perceptions of institutional pressure (institutional pressure centrality level).

This study aims to investigate the impact of corporate governance structures on environmental disclosure practices in the Middle East and Africa (MEA).

The research model uses a panel data set of 121 publicly listed (non-financial and non-utility) firms from 11 MEA countries over the period 2010-2017, uses alternative dependent variables and regression techniques and is applied to various sub-groups to improve robustness.

The empirical results strongly indicate that MEA firms with high governance disclosures tend to have better environmental disclosure practices. The board characteristics of gender diversity, size, CEO/chairperson duality and audit committee size impact positively on MEA firms’ voluntary environmental disclosures, whereas board independence has a negative influence.

This study advances research on the relationship between corporate governance structures and environmental disclosure practices in MEA countries, but is limited to firms for which data are available from Bloomberg.

The results have important practical implications for MEA policymakers and regulators. The positive impact of board gender diversity on firms’ environmental disclosures, policy reforms should aim to increase female directors. MEA corporations aiming to be more environmentally friendly should recruit women to top managerial positions.

This is thought to be the first study to provide insights from the efficiency and legitimation perspectives of neo-institutional theory to explain the relationship between MEA firms’ internal governance structures and environmental disclosures.

While corporations may embrace the concepts of social and environmental responsibility, numerous examples exist to show corporations claiming to act sustainably and responsibly, while simultaneously showing disregard for the communities in which they operate and causing considerable environmental damage.

This chapter argues that such activities illustrate a particular notion of Baumol’s (1990) criminal entrepreneurialism where both creative and constructive compliance combine to subvert environmental regulation and its enforcement.

This chapter employs a case study approach assessing the current corporate environmental responsibility landscape against the reality of corporate environmental offending. Its case study shows seemingly repeated environmental offending by Shell Oil against a backdrop of the company claiming to have integrated environmental monitoring and scrutiny into its operating procedures.

The chapter concludes that corporate assertion of environmental credentials is itself often a form of criminal entrepreneurship where corporations embrace voluntary codes of practice and self-regulation while internally promoting the drive for success and profitability and/or avoidance of the costs of true environmental compliance deemed too high. As a result, this chapter argues that responsibility for environmental damage requires regulation to ensure corporate responsibility for environmental damage.

The chapter employs a green criminological perspective to its analysis of corporate social responsibility and entrepreneurship. Thus, it considers not only just strict legal definitions of crime and criminal behaviour but also the overlap between the legal and the illegal and the preference of governments to use administrative or civil penalties as tools to deal with corporate environmental offending.

The purpose of this paper is to understand the motives behind corporate environmental reporting in Malaysia and Australia from an alternative perspective, i.e. through semiotics.

Reviews are made on the annual reports of the top 50 public companies in both countries, and the uses of business languages in those reports are investigated. The research concentrates on the significations of environmental messages made through paradigmatic and syntagmatic tests.

Corporate environmental disclosures made by the public companies in Malaysia and Australia signify similar form of motives. The tones, orientations, and patterns of environmental disclosures indicate that environmental information is a strategic mechanism used towards enhancing good corporate reputation.

Environmental reporting plays a significant role in promoting corporate “green” image in conjunction with the aims for better social integration.

Semiotics offers a useful basis that enables a greater understanding of why companies prepare and disclose environmental information. Such an understanding holds the potential to provide ideas and guide policy‐makers, and other stakeholders (and users) of corporate environmental information.

This paper is the first to comparatively investigate the corporate motives and intention of environmental reporting practices via the application of semiotics on a two‐country data, specifically Malaysia and Australia.

This paper was motivated by the current debate over the voluntary approach to environmental disclosures in corporate annual reports and assesses the effectiveness of the current policy of voluntarism in the UK. A brief review of the relevant theories, which explain why managers might choose to voluntarily provide environmental responsibility information to parties outside the organisation, is presented. With this background, the paper then questions whether the UK government’s faith in voluntarism and the pursuit of best practice will be enough to generate any real change in current environmental reporting practices. We argue that voluntarism is not effective and that there is an urgent need to introduce strict governmental regulations on the information that must be disclosed and the form in which it should be presented in corporate annual reports as have been established in several other countries. In addition, further consideration is needed to achieve reforms in academic accounting education in order to improve corporate accountability and transparency in corporate annual reports. Organisations need to respond to the growing demands for corporate social and environmental responsibility and this will be possible with the support of an accounting profession that takes a more proactive approach to engaging with stakeholders. For this to happen, we need to rethink the focus of accounting and business education. We must move away from the dominant model, which treats accountancy as a set of techniques, towards a more holistic approach which recognises the social and environmental impacts of organisational activity.