Corporate reporting metamorphosis: empirical findings from state-owned enterprises

ABSTRACT

Grounded in legitimacy theory, this paper contributes to the study of integrated reporting (IR) practices in the public sector, focusing on state-owned enterprises (SOEs)—organizations situated at the boundary between the public and private sector. The findings demonstrate a fair degree of compliance with IR framework (IRF) requirements and identify size, social and environmental sensitivity and conciseness as relevant determinants. Empirical research on IR in the public sector has, to date, been minimal.

IMPACT

The level of compliance by European state-owned enterprises (SOEs) with the integrated reporting framework (IRF) is investigated in this paper. Possible determinants of levels of disclosure are also explored. The results show high compliance by large entities, as well as by organizations in environmental and socially sensitive sectors in respect to issues traditionally disclosed in financial reporting. However, there is still limited disclosure of forward-looking content elements. Standard setters and policy-makers might consider these results as a stimulus to develop specific guidelines to support the preparation of more holistic reports by public sector entities and specifically SOEs.

KEYWORDS:

• Accountability
• disclosure
• integrated reporting (IR)
• public sector
• state-owned enterprises

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).