Making Social and Environmental Accounting Research Relevant in Developing Countries: A Matter of Context

摘要

There has been growing interest over the past decade in the extent and nature of, and motivations for, social and environmental accounting (SEA) in lesser developed country (LDC) contexts. Yet, much of that research uses theory, constructs and measures that have been found to be relevant for understanding the phenomenon in developed economies. In particular, the role of regulation, the take-up of reporting frameworks such as the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and the influence of company characteristics such as size, ownership structure and industry affiliation have been studied extensively (Liu and Anbumozhi 2009; Liu et al. 2010; Weber 2014). Whilst some papers may talk about the social and political 'context' in which the companies being examined operate, this is often not well defined and little consideration is given to what this means.