TITLE:
Relationships between Corporate Social Responsibility, Sustainability Assurance, and Adoption of Integrated Reporting in Public Sector
AUTHORS:
Juliana Padua Lovatte Assis, Joshua Onome Imoniana, José Roberto Kassai, Edgard Bruno Cornacchione, Luciane Reginato
KEYWORDS:
Corporate Social Responsibility, Sustainability Assurance, Integrated Reporting, Public Institution, Public Sector, Sustainability Development Goals
JOURNAL NAME:
Creative Education,
Vol.14 No.11,
November
22,
2023
ABSTRACT: This study investigates the relationships between Corporate Social
Responsibility (CSR), sustainability assurance (SA), and integrated reporting
(IR) in the public sector. In the public sector, account also matters to the
society at large. However, accountability
reports are inaccessible apart from being clumsy and complex for
readability when presented. Therefore, there is a need for a report modelled in
a more transparent, concise, and understandable manner, following amenable
disclosing approach. This study uses a mixed-methods approach to analyze the data
corpora derived from the content analysis of Brazilian public institutions
(BNDES, Caixa, and Correios) for the periods 2015 and 2019. Results indicate
that SA is intimately related to CSR inasmuch as it assures information to
stakeholders following sustainable footprint, and it has expanded to IR by
addressing the challenges of robustness, conciseness and objectivity of
presentation. BNDES and Caixa, which are close to full adoption of IR, are far
ahead of Correios in relation to adoption of IR, enabling the inference that
the public organizations are adopting IR at different paces. This study
contributes to pioneering the analysis of Corporate Social Responsibility,
Sustainability Assurance, and Integrated reporting, thus advancing in theory
and practice of corporate sustainability reporting. Results help in
comprehending the potential relationship between CSR, sustainability assurance,
and integrated reporting as a means of integration of sustainability reporting
in public administration, which addresses the implications of environmental
sustainability reporting for the achievement of the Sustainable Development
Goals (SDG).