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Brand crisis has become an increasingly common phenomenon recently. While corporate social responsibility (CSR) plays a role in mitigating the negative consequences of brand crisis, it is not always effective, especially for foreign companies. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the differential effects of CSR on brand crisis, considering the impact of country of origin and consumer ethnocentrism.

This study used a 2 (country of origins: domestic vs foreign) × 2 (consumer ethnocentrism: high vs low) × 2 (CSR: before vs after related information is presented) between-subjects experiment to simulate a brand crisis. A fictional WeChat Moment posting was used as a stimulus. Data from 210 Chinese respondents were analyzed.

When consumer ethnocentrism is high, the impact of CSR on consumer attitude toward the company undergoing a crisis was greater for domestic than for foreign companies. Conversely, for consumers with low ethnocentrism, the effectiveness of CSR in attenuating the negative impact of the brand crisis (i.e. the insurance-like effect of CSR) was insignificant across domestic and foreign companies.

This study extends the prior literature and clarifies the unclear results of previous studies on the effect of CSR on brand crisis by examining the impact of country of origin and consumer ethnocentrism. Novel insights into the insurance-like effect of CSR in brand crises were obtained.

The aim of this study is to investigate the role of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in assisting firms in their response to public emergency crises under the integrated view of government emergency response.

Using event study and survival analysis method, the authors examine whether CSR can act as a stock price stabilizer for companies from China by splitting the stock price fluctuations into two phases – CSR price insurance, which decrease the shock on stock prices during the emergency crisis, and CSR price recovery, which helps stock prices rebound faster during the postcrisis phase.

The authors’ empirical results confirm the stabilizer role of CSR during crisis and that effective government response can strengthen such effect. Furthermore, the authors examine the different aspects of the government’s response and the impact of multiple waves of public emergency.

This study provides empirical evidence on the topic of CSR and the government’s response to public emergency under the emerging context.

The purpose of this paper is to test if building reputation capital through environmental, social and governance (ESG) investing can mitigate the negative effect of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) on firms’ valuation.

This study uses an unbalanced panel of 591 financial firms between 2005 and 2021 from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom (UK) and the USA. Ordinary least square method is used in the empirical tests. To alleviate a potential endogeneity problem, robustness tests are performed using the two-stage least square approach with instrumental variables.

The results of this paper show that sustainable reporting can offset the negative effect of EPU on the valuation of financial firms. Consistent with the stakeholder-based reputation-building hypothesis, sustainability performance may have an insurance-like impact on firms’ valuation during periods of high uncertainty.

According to the findings, during high policy uncertainty periods, investors accept to pay a premium for the stocks of the firms which built social capital through environmental and social investments. Accordingly, it is suggested that regulatory bodies and governments motivate firms to increase their stakeholder orientation to attain higher reputation capital.

Managers can mitigate the negative impact of policy uncertainty on the value of their firms via building social capital, which will increase financial market stability in return, and portfolio investors may use such firms for portfolio optimization decisions.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is one of the first to examine the mitigating role of ESG investing on EPU and firm valuation relationships for financial firms. Thus, this study provides new insights related to the impact of ESG performance on valuation during uncertain times.

This study aims to investigate the bright and dark sides of environmental, social and governance (ESG) during the COVID-19 pandemic, including both the outbreak and recovery periods, for the Chinese hospitality industry.

Using panel data of 564 firm-quarter observations from 2018 to 2020, the authors adopt fixed-effects regression estimation with standard errors clustered at the firm level. To address potential endogeneity concerns, the authors also use the two-stage least squares estimator with instrumental variables.

The results suggest that ESG plays different roles in market- and accounting-based performance during the COVID-19 outbreak and recovery periods. Specifically, ESG practices show a bright side as a reputation builder to mitigate the negative pandemic impact on market-based performance, whereas the dark side of ESG practices consumes firm resources to aggravate the negative pandemic impact on accounting-based performance during the coronavirus outbreak. These results also suggest hospitality companies benefit bountifully from ESG practices during the COVID-19 recovery.

ESG plays a vital role for hospitality firms by providing insurance-like protection during and after the COVID-19 outbreak. Additionally, hospitality firms should evaluate their capability to adapt resource-consuming ESG practices.

Existing hospitality COVID-19 studies have investigated the effect of ESG on firm performance within a short period with mixed results. This study extends the literature by showing the different effects of ESG practices on market- and accounting-based performance during the COVID-19 outbreak and recovery periods.

This paper aims to contribute to the literature on the earnings management (EM)–corporate social responsibility (CSR) relationship as most of the previous studies have been carried out in non-turbulent periods. This study investigates whether CSR affects EM during the pandemic period by testing two hypotheses: the cognitive biases hypothesis and the resilience hypothesis

The difference-in-difference and triple difference approaches are used for a sample of 536 US firms (268 socially responsible firms and 268 matched non-socially responsible counterparts) during the 2017–2021 period. Socially responsible firms are selected from the MSCI KLD 400 Social Index, and matched firms are identified through the propensity score matching method.

The authors find an income-increasing practice for both socially responsible firms and control firms for the whole period and each sub-period. Moreover, socially responsible firms are more likely to manage their earnings (income increasing) than their counterpart. Furthermore, the authors show that CSR commitment exacerbated EM in line with the cognitive biases hypothesis.

This study is the first shed light on the dark side of CSR during pandemic periods.

This study aims to examine the association between women on board and business performance. It also aims to investigate the impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and female directors on stock prices, including the function of female directors in moderating the CSR–market performance link that ultimately provides valuable insights into the impact of gender diversity on corporate boards.

Data from US publicly listed firms between 2000 and 2018 were collected and analysed using OLS regression, median regression, M-estimator regression and MM-estimator regression at 70% and 95% efficiency. In this study, firm market value was measured through Tobin’s Q, board diversity with ISS database and CSR strength and concern with the KLD database.

The results indicated that CSR positively impacts market performance by 3.1%, female board representation positively influences market performance by 4.8% and female board members strengthen the CSR–market performance relationship by 1.0% while playing a moderating role. Overall, these studies demonstrated the significance of female boards of directors for enhancing market performance.

This study used the data of US-listed firms from 2000 to 2018. The results have contributed to the ongoing discussion about the importance of gender diversity in boards and its influence on firm success. Further research works are suggested to expand the analysis by including other countries or considering additional factors that may influence the association between CSR, board representation of women and market share.

This study is essential for investors, legislators and CSR institutions in developed countries. The favourable impact of female board presence on market performance and the enhancement of the CSR–market performance relationship highlight the necessity of encouraging gender diversity on boards of directors and CSR activities.

This study emphasises the significance of gender balance on corporate boards in solving important social challenges including climate change, resource scarcity and gender equality. Companies can actively assist in addressing global issues and improving the well-being of stakeholders by promoting gender-diverse boards and encouraging CSR efforts.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first study demonstrating that gender diversity on corporate boards moderates the significant association between CSR performance and profitability in the USA. It has contributed to the expanding body of information regarding the moderating influence of female directors on firm value and stronger evidence for female directors in the governance of businesses.

Misconduct allegations have been found to not only affect the alleged firm but also other, unalleged firms in form of reputational and financial spillover effects. It has remained unexplored, however, how the number of prior allegations against other firms matters for an individual firm currently facing an allegation. Building on behavioral decision theory, we argue that the relationship between allegation prevalence among other firms and investor reaction to a focal allegation is inverted U-shaped. The inverted U-shaped effect is theorized to emerge from the combination of two effects: In the absence of prior allegations against other firms, investors fail to anticipate the focal allegation, and hence react particularly negatively (“anticipation effect”). In the case of many prior allegations against other firms, investors also react particularly negatively because investors perceive the focal allegation as more warranted (“evaluation effect”). The multi-industry, empirical analysis of 8,802 misconduct allegations against US firms between 2007 and 2017 provides support for our predicted, inverted U-shaped effect. Our study complements recent misconduct research on spillover effects by highlighting that not only a current allegation against an individual firm can “contaminate” other, unalleged firms but that also prior allegations against other firms can “contaminate” investor reaction to a focal allegation against an individual firm.

Little attention has been given to the effects of returnee entrepreneurs on external and internal corporate social responsibility (CSR). This study aims to investigate whether returnee entrepreneurs engage in more external or internal CSR and to further explore the contingency effects of foreign market embeddedness and local government endorsement.

This study uses 11,967 startups in China to examine the relationship between returnee entrepreneurs and external and internal CSR. The authors use an ordinary least square regression and propensity scoring matching approach to analyze the data.

The empirical results show that returnee entrepreneurs are more likely to undertake external CSR but less likely to undertake internal CSR. Foreign market embeddedness and local government endorsement have opposite moderating effects on these relationships.

This study has important implications for returnee entrepreneurs’ strategic choice between external and internal CSR and also provides theoretical support for policymakers to make effective and enforceable CSR policies.

This study discusses how returnee entrepreneurs implement external or internal CSR in China, answering the call to distinguish between external and internal CSR. Drawing on a legitimacy perspective, the authors find interesting and seemingly counterintuitive effects of returnees on external and internal CSR, which also necessitates distinguishing between these two types of CSR. In addition, the authors find different moderating roles of foreign market embeddedness and local government endorsement.

This study, informed by the Situational Crisis Communication Theory, aims to suggest two primary response strategies that can be used for effective internal crisis communication during a pandemic situation, such as COVID-19. The effect of base response strategies on employees' perceptions of communication quality, leadership and relational outcomes were investigated.

An online survey of full-time employees in the United States was conducted.

The findings showed that for an instructing information strategy, not all types of information were equally associated with positive employee responses in terms of perceived quality of internal communication related to the COVID-19 pandemic and transformational leadership. Specific information that employees need to know in order to safely perform daily tasks, such as organizational protocols and thorough preparation, seem to be the most needed and desired information. Adjusting information was positively associated with employee perceptions of internal communication quality and perceptions of CEO leadership. Employees' perceived quality of internal communication affected by the base crisis response strategies were positively correlated with perceptions of transformational leadership and relational outcomes (i.e. employee trust in the organization, employee perceptions of the organization's commitment to relationships with employees, employee support for organizational decision-making related to COVID-19).

This study presents important theoretical and practical insights through an interdisciplinary approach that applies the theoretical framework and relationship-oriented outcomes of public relations to public health crisis situations.

The purpose of this study is to look at the multifaceted relationship mechanism between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and organizational performance (OP) via sustainability risk management (SRM) and organizational reputation (OR).

This research connects CSR to OP via SRM and OR. Based on a sample of 325 managers of multinational firms in India, a theoretical model was proposed and analyzed through sequential mediation regressions analysis.

The findings indicate that CSR is positively and appreciably associated with OP. Furthermore, SRM and OR have been found to have a sequentially mediating effect on the interrelationship between CSR and OP. The study recognizes that organizations with a proactive approach to CSR tend to manage sustainability risk more actively, which helps to improve OR and ultimately results in better OP.

The research advances understanding of the triple bottom line and offers a platform for building strategic and successful CSR policies by offering valuable insights on the link between CSR and OP.