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This study aims to use the gender socialization theory, critical mass theory and legitimacy theory to examine the female gender and environmental disclosure of family and non-family-controlled firms in India.

A sample size of 783 and 177 firm-year observations for family and non-family-controlled firms, respectively, between 2009 and 2020 uses descriptive statistics, a test of difference in means and panel regression with random effect assumptions for data interpretation.

The descriptive statistics show a significant mean difference between family-controlled firms and non-family-controlled firms in India. The first findings show that female chief executive officers (CEOs) and CEO duality have a positive and statistically significant association with environmental disclosure in a family-controlled firm but not in non-family-controlled firms in India. The second findings show that independent female directors have no significant association with environmental disclosure of family and non-family firms in India. The fourth findings with critical mass theory confirm the insignificant association of female directors on environmental disclosure of family and non-family firms in India. The results are robust to controlling firm-level variables.

Firms in the Indian context, through this study, assure stakeholders that family firms are better at improving stakeholder’s expectation of environmental accountability than non-family firms, especially where female CEOs are in charge.

This study adds the family perspective of the relationship between female CEOs and the environmental disclosure of listed firms in India. Also, female CEO duality and environmental disclosure add novelty to the research studies on gender and environmental disclosure.

The study aims to examine whether corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure does improve debt financing of listed firms with sustainable development agendas coupled with high chief executive officer (CEO) tenure in India.

Employing panel regression based on fixed effect and instrumental variable regression with fixed effect assumptions, the study examined data from the Bombay stock exchange from the period 2010 to 2019.

The study demonstrates that the disclosure of current exchange capital and moral capital cannot cause a firm to access short-term and long-term debt financing. However, lag investment in moral capital causes a positive effect on short-term debt financing. The second findings show that CEO tenure has a positive and statistically significant association with short-term debt financing and an insignificant association with long-term debt financing. The third findings show that the interaction of current CSR disclosure (moral and exchange capital) and CEO tenure is insignificant in affecting short-term and long-term debt finance. However, the interaction of lag CSR disclosure (moral and exchange capital) and CEO tenure positively affect short-term debt financing. The study addresses any endogeneity concerns arising from the CSR disclosure-debt financing association.

This study uses a single country to examine the inter-relationship between CEO tenure and debt financing and CSR measured by moral capital and exchange capital, thereby limiting the study's results for generalisation.

The observation is that moral capital investment and disclosure do not guarantee new entrants the chance to access debt financing, but subsequent and lag CSR disclosure ensures access.

No studies examine morality from CSR disclosure on debt financing. This study shows that decoupling CSR into exchange capital and moral capital in accessing debt financing presents new inputs for scholarly debate on CSR.

The purpose of this study is to examine adaptation to a dynamic business environment from the perspective of family and non-family firms. Furthermore, the study provides a comparative component and proposes a theoretical framework to understand firm adaptation, incorporating the dynamic capabilities approach.

Semi-structured, in-depth, face-to-face interviews were undertaken predominantly with firm owners and managers of family and non-family-owned firms operating in Western Australia.

Regardless of firms’ family or non-family background, valuable, rare, imperfectly imitable and non-substitutable attributes were strongly associated with both groups. Moreover, expertise, tacit and new knowledge, innovation or established brand image emerged as key adaptive responses to challenges posed by new trends, consumer expectations, increased demand or competition. These attributes allowed firms to sense and seize opportunities, and experience transformational processes to remain competitive. Implications of the findings and future research directions will be discussed.

First, and empirically, the study’s objectives contribute to addressing extant research gaps, including scant research on methodologies and innovative approaches used by family firms to adapt to contemporary challenges. Thus, the study complements entrepreneurship scholarly discourses on firms’ adaptation. Second, the chosen inductive approach results in the development of a framework, which also exhibits various relationships with the adopted dynamic capabilities approach. Both the findings and the developed framework enhance the understanding of adaptive behaviour among both family and non-family firms. Finally, the study contributes to the literature examining firms operating in geographically dispersed and isolated regions.