The Board of Directors and Assurance on CSR disclosure: The role of the AC and the Environmental Committee
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2018-06-26
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en
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Abstract
Over the last past years a few extensive greenwashing scandals came to the light, which can be a threat for the confidence of shareholders and other stakeholder in the organizations itself and CSR disclosure as a whole. Several corporate governance mechanisms such as the board of directors can act upon this to assist in preventing greenwashing scandals. Based on a panel data set comprised of 983 European publicly traded firms from 20 different countries during the period 2005-2015, this study examines the influence of the audit committee and the environmental committee on firms’ choices toward voluntary assurance on their CSR reports by an independent third-party (SA). The results provide evidence that firms that have an audit committee with superior strength in terms of independence and expertise, and an environmental committee comprised of environmental experts on their board of directors are more likely to employ SA than firms that do not have such committees on their board. Furthermore, firms that have an environmental committee comprised of environmental experts on their board of directors are more likely to acquire SA services that are of a higher quality in terms of an SA standard than firms that do not have such a committee on their board. These results indicate that particularly the environmental committee can be an effective corporate governance mechanism to improve the credibility of CSR reports through acquiring SA services that are of a higher quality. Acquiring SA services that are of a higher quality may lead to a decrease in greenwashing scandals which increases the confidence of shareholders and other stakeholders in CSR disclosure.
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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen