Final published version
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Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - The pre-history of sustainability reporting: a constructivist reading
AU - Larrinaga, Carlos
AU - Bebbington, Jan
PY - 2021/6/2
Y1 - 2021/6/2
N2 - PurposeThe aim of this paper is to provide an account of the period prior to the creation of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI): a body that was critical to the institutionalization of sustainability reporting (SR). By examining this “pre-history,” we bring to light the actors, activities and ways of thinking that made SR more likely to be institutionalized once the GRI entrepreneurship came to the fore.Design/methodology/approachThe paper revisits a time period (the 1990s) that has yet to be formally written about in any depth and traces the early development of what became SR. This material is examined using a constructivist understanding of regulation.FindingsThe authors contend that a convergence of actors and structural conditions were pivotal to the development of SR. Specifically, this paper demonstrates that a combination of actors (such as epistemic communities, carriers, regulators and reporters) as well as the presence of certain conditions (such as the societal context, analogies with financial reporting, environmental reporting and reporting design issues) contributed to the development of SR which was consolidated (as well as extended) in 1999 with the advent of the GRI.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper theorizes (through a historical analysis) how SR is sustained by a network of institutional actors and conditions which can assist reflection on future SR development.Originality/valueThis paper brings together empirical material from a time that (sadly) is passing from living memory. The paper also extends the use of a conceptual frame that is starting to influence scholarship in accounting that seeks to understand how norms develop.
AB - PurposeThe aim of this paper is to provide an account of the period prior to the creation of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI): a body that was critical to the institutionalization of sustainability reporting (SR). By examining this “pre-history,” we bring to light the actors, activities and ways of thinking that made SR more likely to be institutionalized once the GRI entrepreneurship came to the fore.Design/methodology/approachThe paper revisits a time period (the 1990s) that has yet to be formally written about in any depth and traces the early development of what became SR. This material is examined using a constructivist understanding of regulation.FindingsThe authors contend that a convergence of actors and structural conditions were pivotal to the development of SR. Specifically, this paper demonstrates that a combination of actors (such as epistemic communities, carriers, regulators and reporters) as well as the presence of certain conditions (such as the societal context, analogies with financial reporting, environmental reporting and reporting design issues) contributed to the development of SR which was consolidated (as well as extended) in 1999 with the advent of the GRI.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper theorizes (through a historical analysis) how SR is sustained by a network of institutional actors and conditions which can assist reflection on future SR development.Originality/valueThis paper brings together empirical material from a time that (sadly) is passing from living memory. The paper also extends the use of a conceptual frame that is starting to influence scholarship in accounting that seeks to understand how norms develop.
KW - Sustainability reporting
KW - Environmental reporting
KW - Normativity
U2 - 10.1108/AAAJ-03-2017-2872
DO - 10.1108/AAAJ-03-2017-2872
M3 - Journal article
VL - 34
SP - 131
EP - 150
JO - Accounting, Auditing and Accountability Journal
JF - Accounting, Auditing and Accountability Journal
SN - 0951-3574
IS - 9
ER -