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This study aims to investigate how New Zealand companies use Twitter to communicate and engage effectively with stakeholders during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This study proposes a conceptual framework for effective stakeholder engagement by using social media to analyse the themes and emotion of company tweets during the COVID-19 pandemic in New Zealand. The engagement of stakeholders with these tweets is also examined. This study argues that companies use selected themes and emotive language to connect with their stakeholders.

The findings show that selective themes and emotions are useful in company COVID-19 tweets to engage with the stakeholders. COVID-19 tweets contained significantly more emotion than non-COVID tweets, with emotions that can convey empathy being the most common. By presenting themselves as real, personable and empathetic towards others through emotive language, companies can engage in more meaningful and ethical way with their stakeholders.

The paper has implications for managing company communications by providing empirical evidence that both the themes and emotion expressed in the messages are important for effective stakeholder engagement in social media.

The conceptual framework for effective stakeholder engagement using social media is novel and can be used to evaluate and investigate stakeholder engagement during a global crisis.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the current discussions about the concept of Integrated Reporting (IR) and provides a practical and useful proposal of an instrument that could help to apply the IR concept in corporate practice.

The study uses a deductive normative research approach.

Based on a comprehensive review of international literature and research, the paper argues that a structured presentation of the traditional measure of “value added” in a so-called “value added statement” (VAS) has the potential to serve as a practical and effective reporting instrument for IR. The proposed VAS not only meets the guiding principles of IR but also reports on the monetary effects of different types of capital included in IR and in this way complements and represents the concept of IR very well.

The authors intend to stimulate the academic as well as institutional discussion on how to apply the concept of IR at the corporate level. As the characteristics of the proposed VAS comply well with the guiding principles and concepts developed in the Integrated Reporting Framework project of the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) and with the ultimate objective of integrated thinking, the study can inform the current considerations within and outside of the IIRC.

The future of IR and the probability of its world-wide application in practice will depend on the development of appropriate reporting tools that incorporate the central ideas of IR, currently no such reporting tools exist. In this paper the authors make an argument for a VAS as a complementing, useful and therefore appropriate reporting tool for IR.

This paper aims to investigate corporate motivations for voluntarily reporting social and environmental information in New Zealand. The approach used in this study also gives the opportunity to gain insights into the internal systems and views of companies and allows the authors to make better judgements of the intentions of companies in undertaking corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting.

A survey is used and then extended to match corporate survey responses with content analysis results of actual company reporting. The results of the survey and the content analysis are examined both individually and collectively to gather more context for corporate motivations.

The authors find that community concerns and shareholder rights were the most important factors that influenced the companies’ decision to report. The driving force for a sustainability agenda within these companies is usually a member of senior management. The authors also find that reporting frameworks and highly formalised internal systems were not frequently used, external assurance of CSR reporting was lacking and there were low levels of stakeholder engagement. A commitment to reporting comprehensive CSR disclosures and accepting responsibility towards a range of stakeholders were, therefore, not in evidence.

For researchers, the value is in further revising analysis techniques and expanding existing research methods used in this area. The study brings together important CSR topics from across the literature, including reporting levels and characteristics, internal CSR systems, CSR assurance and stakeholder engagement, to investigate the motivation for CSR reporting.

The results suggest that New Zealand companies are not currently fully committed to social and environmental reporting and that CSR reporting is most likely used to create the impression of being concerned about sustainability to increase legitimacy with stakeholders and society. The results highlight the importance of having formalised systems to ensure that disclosures are accurate and comprehensive.

The results contribute to the literature by providing a current view of the motivations for reporting companies to report or not report. The approach used gives the opportunity to gain insights into the internal systems and views of companies and allows the authors to make better judgements of the intentions of companies in undertaking CSR reporting.

The natural environment has become an increasingly important business issue over the last ten years while shareholder views on the importance of corporate environmental disclosure have not been extensively investigated. The purpose of this paper is to report the requirements of individual shareholders for the disclosure and regulation of environmental information and their intended use of the information.

Respondents were questioned using an online survey whether they want specific types of environmental information from companies and if so, where they want it disclosed, why they want it disclosed and if they feel strongly enough about it to want it made compulsory and be subject to an audit. The authors regard New Zealand as an ideal experimental setting for the investigation of shareholder views and focus on the members of an active shareholders' association in New Zealand and obtain a very high response rate.

The paper finds that most shareholders are very positive about the disclosure of a range of environmental information items and furthermore they want environmental information to be made compulsory, to be audited, and to be published in the annual report and also on the company website. The most important reason given by shareholders for requiring environmental information is that they want companies to be accountable for their environmental impacts. The results are potentially significant for company governance and management decision making and will also have policy implications for regulators.

The findings have important implications for the government, the accounting profession and other standard setters. The paper suggests that the time has come for legislators, regulatory bodies and standard setters to take note of the policy implications if such a large proportion (59 percent – 72 percent) of shareholders want environmental disclosure to be compulsory and prescribed and not left to the discretion of companies.

The information needs of individual shareholders who make their own investment decisions should be of great interest to regulators, because such investors rely on publicly available information, whereas institutional investors also collect private information. Regulators need to remove information asymmetry by regulating and/or mandating disclosures and shareholder requirements for information should be an important consideration.

This paper is of high value. The paper addresses why the information is requested and what it would be used for, something that the studies prior to the year 2000 did not cover. In addition this study is the first to survey New Zealand investors 1996, i.e. prior to the resurgence of late in societal interest in environmental issues.

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the environmental disclosure practices of firms engaged in environmentally sensitive industries by examining their association with environmental performance.

The study tests for associations between environmental performance and the level and nature of environmental disclosures by listed Chinese firms operating in industries that have been identified by a regulator as environmentally sensitive. The level of environmental disclosure is measured using a disclosure index based on the global reporting initiative. The nature of environmental disclosure is measured as the ratio of hard to total disclosure items.

Firms with more favourable environmental performance provide a higher level of environmental disclosure and include a greater proportion of hard disclosure items. However, the overall level of disclosure is lower than that observed in developed countries.

Due to data constraints, the proxy for environmental performance is based on the receipt and maintenance of environmental titles and awards and does not capture variation in the level of environmental performance of firms with no titles or awards.

As China continues to embrace market-based economic reform, the ability to reflect sustainable choices through market transactions is of increasing importance to the preservation of economic, natural and social capital for future generations.

The study examines the relation between environmental reporting and environmental performance by firms operating in industries that have been identified by a regulator as environmentally sensitive.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate: how dimensions of tone vary across different forms of corporate accountability narrative; the impact of tone on readability; and the determinants of tone, including consideration of its use in impression management.

Using a multi-year sample of listed companies, the authors measure dimensions of tone across multiple narrative types within the annual report and standalone corporate social responsibility report. Statistical analysis is used to investigate variations of tone across narrative type, each dimension’s influence on readability and the role of antecedent factors.

Analysis reveals that dimensions of tone vary significantly across narrative types (genres) suggesting that tonal patterns form part of the specific stylistic conventions of each genre. Tone is found to be a significant determinant of readability. Little evidence of obfuscation using tone was found, while disclosure type is the most salient determinant of tone.

The study illuminates latent or underlying disclosure norms that can facilitate the identification of “exceptional” cases that do not conform with expected tonal patterns of a particular narrative type and may warrant closer inspection by preparers, auditors or regulators. The issues raised regarding the clarity and balance of textual disclosures highlight the challenges in regulating corporate narratives.

This study highlights that tone is a more nuanced and layered concept than suggested by much of the prior literature. Further, tone ought to be considered in studies examining textual complexity.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the complex and shifting relationship between the Anglo American Corporation (Anglo) and the South African State (“the State”) as reflected in Anglo’s annual reports.

This paper builds on research on the role of annual reports in ideological conflict. To examine the ongoing relationship between Anglo and the State, the authors read all the annual reports published by Anglo American from 1917 to 1975, looking for instances in which the corporation appeared to be attempting to address, criticise, compliment, or implore the State.

During the period under study, despite the apparent struggles between the South African State and Anglo American, the relationship between the two was primarily symbiotic. The symbolic confrontation engaged in by these two behemoths perpetuated the real, physical violence perpetrated on the oppressed workers. By appearing to be a liberal opponent of apartheid, Anglo was able to ensure continued investment in South Africa.

The examination of decades’ worth of annual reports provides an example of how these supposedly neutral instruments were used to contest and sustain power. Thereby, Anglo could continue to exploit workers, reap enormous profits, and maintain a fiction of opposition to the oppressive State. The State also benefited from its support of Anglo, which provided a plurality of tax revenue and economic expansion during the period.

This paper provides insights into the ways the State and other institutions sustain each other in the pursuit of economic and political power in the face of visible and widely condemned injustices. Although they frequently contested each other’s primacy, both benefited while black South African miners suffered.