Implications of Managerial Framing of Stakeholders in Environmental Reports

Tiina Onkila, Kristiina Joensuu, Marileena Koskela
2014 Social and Environmental Accountability Journal  
Corporate environmental reports are increasingly viewed as products of the managerial framing of responsibility and stakeholders. This notion encouraged us to conduct a multiple-case study on how stakeholders are framed in environmental reports. We show how interaction between companies and stakeholders is described in the environmental reports of three firms operating in different business sectors -financial, aviation, and energy -over a period of five years. We use an inductively oriented
more » ... ent analysis to identify five categories of relationships being constructed in the data: demanding, promoting, committing, donating, and preventing. We then show how commitment and promotion dominate. We conclude by discussing the implications of this type of managerial framing to maintaining business-as-usual approaches to corporate environmentalism and show how the critique of environmental reports derives from stakeholder accountability and critical approaches. We argue that managerial framing of stakeholders in environmental reports partly explains the increased criticism among stakeholder representatives and academics.
doi:10.1080/0969160x.2013.870488 fatcat:x6tqzeypyrbfvabn7rba63bhkq