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This paper aims to explore the extent, nature and communication potential of companies’ use of three popular social media platforms (Facebook, X and LinkedIn) to report on sustainability.

Qualitative methodology through the use of the netnography approach was adopted to evaluate the use of social media for sustainability communication by the Top 50 ASX companies. Content analysis of all company posts determined those with social and environmental content. A thematic analysis was performed using the global reporting initiative (GRI) framework to examine the nature of the reporting. The media richness framework was used to measure the communication potential of the social media platforms for sustainability communication.

The results indicated that the extent of sustainability posts on social media represented less than 20% of total social media posts. The nature of posts by the Top 50 ASX companies was higher on social issues than on environmental issues, which is contradictory to many previous studies. The study also found that while the social media platforms afforded high levels of media richness, most companies failed to exploit the platforms’ full potential to disseminate sustainability information.

This work provides both empirical and theoretical contributions to the ongoing debate concerning the use of social media for sustainability communication. The paper extends Lodhia et al.’s (2020) study of social media use for legitimation purposes and adapts Lodhia’s (2004) media richness framework to social media for sustainability reporting. It adds empirical insights into social media’s communication potential and value for communicating sustainability information.

The extent and nature to which organisations use social media to disclose their sustainability performance has significant practical implications for a variety of stakeholders. The results reveal to these stakeholders and the companies themselves the level of utilisation of social media along with the potential that can be harnessed. These results can potentially improve the quantity, timeliness and usability of sustainability reporting using social media platforms.

The study provides valuable evidence to increase understanding of the sustainability social media communication landscape, which organisations can potentially leverage to communicate their messages. Additionally, sustainability awareness is increased across various demographics by disseminating sustainability information to the wider public. This study will assist policy-setters in developing guidance for using social media for sustainability reporting.

This study extends existing literature, particularly the Lodhia et al. (2020) study, which has primarily focused on examining sustainability content in the media with limited exploration of the communication potential of social media platforms to communicate sustainability content.

This paper provides insights into Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Accounting and Reporting for the Other Sector, defined as organisations that are not corporations and do not have profitability as their overriding success criterion.

This is a conceptual paper that addresses the impact of SDGs on the Other Sector and the accounting and reporting of them by these organisations.

There are a number of implications for research in relation to theories, research approaches and the crossing over of disciplines in relation to the Other Sector’s SDGs accounting and reporting.

The research insights from this paper can be applied to inform the SDGs accounting and reporting practice of the Other Sector.

This paper addresses the impact of the recent sustainability development, the SDGs, on a sector that is very different from the corporate sector and highlights the benefit of accounting and reporting of these goals for the Other Sector.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how stakeholders are engaged in the sustainability accounting and reporting processes of Australian local councils.

Managerial stakeholder theory through the use of the notion of stakeholder salience provides a theoretical basis for exploring stakeholder engagement in the sustainability accounting and reporting process. Case study research was used to explore the stakeholder engagement practices of three Australian local councils. Data collection methods included interviews and document analysis.

The findings of this research identified the importance of stakeholder engagement in the entire sustainability accounting and reporting process, the development of strategic plans and sustainability indicators, the measurement of sustainability performance and the preparation of sustainability reports.

This study, by integrating the sustainability accounting and reporting literature with the stakeholder salience concepts of power, legitimacy, urgency and proximity, illustrates the critical role of stakeholder engagement in the sustainability accounting and reporting process of three local councils.

This study has implications for public sector organisations (PSOs) and their stakeholders in relation to stakeholder engagement in sustainability accounting and reporting. The findings of this study will also be useful to corporations in understanding the importance of stakeholder engagement in sustainability accounting and reporting.

The public sector is expected to be a leader in sustainability and this paper provides evidence of three councils who through their stakeholder engagement provide exemplars of useful practices that could be adopted by other entities.

Prior research in PSOs has primarily focused on the sustainability accounting and reporting process but has given limited consideration to the involvement of stakeholders. The focus on stakeholder engagement through the use of managerial stakeholder theory extends the role of stakeholders from merely being an audience for sustainability reports to an influential contributor in the sustainability accounting and reporting process.

This paper aims to consider the vital role that the medium for communication plays in the sustainability reporting process and provides an agenda for advancing research in this area.

This is a theoretical paper that draws upon previous literature to highlight that the newer communication media extends the capabilities of traditional media and provides insights into future research directions.

This paper highlights that communication medium has a critical role in sustainability reporting and changes the dynamics of such reporting, leading to a change in the research approaches to study this phenomenon.

The paper has implications for practitioners in relation to the use of various communication media for sustainability reporting.

The paper highlights that modern information and communication technologies transform reporting into communication, thereby providing potential for enhancing the engagement of stakeholders with a corporation.

This paper suggests that the role of the communication medium is integral to the communication of sustainability issues to stakeholders and that future research needs to justify the choice of the medium used for sustainability reporting studies.

This paper aims to introduce the special issue on “sustainability and accounting for non-financial matters: qualitative and quantitative research approaches”. This special issue was organised at the time when the entire globe was affected by the Coronavirus and accordingly, this paper has taken this opportunity to discuss the implications of this pandemic on accounting for non-financial issues, especially in relation to sustainability accounting research and practice.

An analysis of public documents and limited academic research on the Coronavirus was undertaken in this paper to highlight how life as it existed has fundamentally changed. The authors also review the papers published in this special issue and identifies research opportunities arising from the current environment.

The onslaught of the Coronavirus provides both challenges and opportunities for the practice of, and research into, accounting for non-financial matters, such as sustainability. The papers published in this special issue promote understanding and linking of sustainability reporting practices, to creating firm values, as well as identifying current and emerging challenges. The special issue explores criteria for the construction of accounting technology that is consistent with agnostic-based critical accounting and accountability, a business case for managers and practitioners to formulate strategic and management control systems in response to climate change issues, legitimacy and the use of photographs in sustainability reporting to create value, effective disclosures of business and sustainability ethics practiced by the firm for reputation building and value creation, indigenous accounting in mining companies, public sector policy framing of non-financial value, the barriers to sustainability reporting because of lack of awareness and knowledge and inadequate regulatory support in developing countries and the significance of sustainability accounting education to improve sustainability reporting practices in developing countries.

Future research opportunities in relation to the impact of the Coronavirus on accounting for non-financial value are identified. Given that COVID-19 is a societal matter, the practical implications of the Coronavirus in accounting for non-financial value creation are highlighted. The Coronavirus has challenged the existing economic paradigm and non-financial issues will capture the attention of corporations, other institutions, civil society and governments.

The Coronavirus has challenged the existing economic paradigm and non-financial issues will capture the attention of corporations, other institutions, civil society and governments.

Given that COVID-19 is a societal matter, the practical implications of the Coronavirus in accounting for non-financial value creation are highlighted.

This study, to the knowledge, is one of the pioneer academic studies that has explored the implications of the Coronavirus on accounting for non-financial value. In addition, this special issue includes papers that highlight how non-financial reporting matters are increasingly being given attention by companies to enhance business practices on sustainability through different perspectives.

This paper aims to examine the use of social media for sustainability reporting by the largest Australia companies as a means of seeking legitimacy from stakeholders.

Qualitative content analysis was applied to examine social and environmental disclosures posted by Australian companies on three social media platforms – Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, and to observe stakeholder interaction in relation to the social and environmental postings.

The findings of this study indicate a limited use of social media by the top 50 Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) listed companies for sustainability reporting as only 46 per cent of the companies used Facebook, Twitter and/or LinkedIn. Nevertheless, those companies which actively used social media were able to seek legitimacy through information disclosure and dialogue with stakeholders. Social issues such as community support, employees, gender equality and diversity dominated the three social media platforms when compared to environmental issues and all disclosures had a positive tone. These disclosures in turn framed the dialogue with stakeholders, leading to use of social media platforms that companies preferred and enabling a close control over online discussions.

This study highlights that social media sustainability communication focuses on symbolic legitimacy strategies, leading to companies managing the impressions of their stakeholders and controlling the dialogue with them.

This study provides an understanding of the actual practice of social media sustainability communication and has implications for both organisations and their stakeholders.

This study provides in-depth insights into the use of social media to transform sustainability reporting, an issue that has limited coverage in prior literature and extends the application of legitimacy theory to social media communication.

This study aims to investigate how disclosures through different communication media were used by the Australian mining company Rio Tinto to manage its reputation after the Juukan Gorge Cave Blast.

Case study research was used with a focus on a single case, Rio Tinto and the Juukan Gorge incident. Data on sustainability disclosures were collected from Rio Tinto’s website, corporate reports and social media platforms (Facebook, X and LinkedIn) for the 2020 and 2021 periods. Gioia methodology was applied to analyse disclosure strategies and an extended Reputation Risk Management (RRM) framework was used as a conceptual lens.

The findings reveal a slow and inappropriate initial response from the company resulting in negative reputational consequences for the company’s senior executives. Although the company’s initial response was to avoid responsibility and mitigate offensiveness, it gradually accepted full responsibility and adopted reparation strategies such as corrective action, mortification and stakeholder engagement to rebuild its reputation. The temporal analysis suggests that Rio Tinto was “left behind” as a result of its initial response, limiting the effectiveness of its subsequent RRM strategies.

The findings of this study contribute to an improved understanding of communication strategies for managing a reputation crisis. The extended RRM framework developed in this study provides a comprehensive list of various disclosure strategies that can be used in future studies that analyse disclosure post an environmental or social incident.

The findings of the study provide insights into the effectiveness of different communication strategies when communicating to stakeholders with varied interests. This study highlights that the timing of the response is critical to restoring lost reputation and a slow response which emphasises financial stakeholders at the expense of the affected communities can be detrimental to RRM, no matter how well-intentioned subsequent strategies are.

This research focuses on a marginal stakeholder group, Indigenous people and communities. The findings offer insights to society into whether corporate strategies to manage a reputation crisis promote and support equity and inclusivity.

This study focuses on a community-based stakeholder, Indigenous groups, a context that has unique cultural intricacies and requires a transition beyond a corporate perspective on RRM.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a model to assess web-based corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure prominence and use this model to explore the prominence of CSR disclosures of listed New Zealand (NZ) companies.

A CSR Disclosure Prominence Indicator Model was constructed using five key elements that include the dissemination medium, accessibility, location, content variety and extent of CSR disclosures. The websites of 65 of the largest listed NZ companies from 11 industry groupings were explored through this model.

A significant proportion (81.5 per cent) of listed NZ companies in the sample were utilising their websites for communicating CSR information to stakeholders. The CSR Disclosure Prominence Indicator Model revealed that companies that have CSR-related disclosures on their websites used multiple dissemination media and locations to enhance prominence of such disclosures. CSR commentary on the webpage was the most prominent dissemination medium due to its ease of accessibility, with a separate CSR webpage being the most prominent location. Environmental performance and society-related issues received the most prominent emphasis. Although companies from “sensitive” industry sectors appeared to disclose their CSR information more prominently, those from “less sensitive” industries also attempted to make their CSR disclosure more prominent and noticeable through strategic placement and through the extent of disclosure.

The paper highlights the importance of managing web-based CSR disclosure prominence, thereby highlighting its significance in communication of CSR information.

Prominently placed CSR disclosures could be a significant platform for companies to strategically manage their image and identity. The CSR Disclosure Prominence Indicator Model could be utilised by companies to effectively assess and manage the prominence of CSR disclosures on their websites for more effective communication with stakeholders.

The paper complements earlier studies on CSR disclosures by constructing and applying a model to assess the prominence of web-based CSR disclosures.

This paper aims to explore the key issues and challenges that can affect the quality of stakeholder engagement processes and outcomes in relation to sustainability reporting.

Case study research was used to gain in-depth insights into the stakeholder engagement practices of three Australian local councils.

The findings of this study suggest that the effectiveness of stakeholder engagement can be undermined by certain difficulties and challenges faced by an organisation. These include limited resources, lack of commitment from internal stakeholders, political factors, heterogeneous concerns, inadequate representation and an unwillingness to engage.

The study adds to the limited literature on stakeholder engagement in sustainability reporting specifically and on sustainability accounting and reporting in public sector organisations (PSOs) more generally.

This research provides practical guidance to government authorities on the challenges that need to be addressed to enable an effective stakeholder engagement process for sustainability reporting.

Stakeholders have a critical role in holding organisations accountable and research into their engagement with these organisations has societal benefits.

This research while focused on the Australian context has international relevance as it provides unique insights into the stakeholder engagement process. The implications of this research apply to not just PSOs but also corporations that are grappling with the (difficult) process of effective engagement with stakeholders.

This study aims to explore the use of corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosures by the “Big Four” Australian banks post the banking royal commission (BRC) to manage their reputational risk.

This paper uses a case study approach through a thematic analysis of the Big Four banks’ annual and sustainability reports and uses reputation risk management (RRM) as a conceptual lens to explore the image restoration strategies used by these banks.

The study finds that a corrective action strategy was disclosed extensively by all four banks whereby each bank outlined the actions that they were undertaking to correct the deficiencies identified by the BRC. However, the impact of these proposed actions was tampered by the fact that each bank sought to use strategies to reduce the offensiveness of their misdemeanours. It is argued that while disclosure on corrective actions and compensation is useful, an emphasis on reducing offensiveness of actions impacts the effectiveness of banks’ responses and their acceptance of full responsibility for their actions.

This paper applies the RRM perspective to a recent reputation damaging event, thereby expanding the literature on image restoration strategies used by companies during major incidents.

This study provides useful insights in relation to the approaches used to manage the reputational risk arising from the BRC. It provides insights into the credibility of information disclosed post an incident and has potential implications for the assurance of such information.

Given the critical importance of the banking industry to modern society, misconduct in this sector needs a closer examination, requiring a greater need for responsibility from its key players.

This study extends the applicability of the RRM perspective to a social incident and highlights that it is reputation, rather than legitimacy, that is critical when organisations in an industry face extensive public scrutiny. A thematic analysis approach adds value to the methods used for analysing CSR disclosures.