Social and environmental NGOs’ perceptions of Corporate Social Disclosures: The Case of Bangladesh

Abstract

This paper explores the perceptions of Corporate Social Disclosure (CSD) in non-government organisations within the context of a developing country: Bangladesh. Many prior studies have looked at CSD practice from the managerial perspective, while providing less of an insight into non-managerial stakeholder perspectives. Several researchers have argued that the social and environmental accounting literature needs to incorporate the voice of non-managerial stakeholders in CSD development. This paper contributes to the stakeholder-perception-based CSD literature. Semi-structured interviews were carried out in selected social and environmental NGOs of both overseas and Bangladeshi origin. The results suggest that NGO executives are sceptical of current CSD practice. To them, current CSD is ad hoc and no more than a public relations exercise, lacking credibility. Most importantly, owing to structural constraints NGO executives assign lesser significance to CSD than to direct corporate involvement in social development. They described structural constraints as: high levels of poverty, weak governmental structures, dependence on foreign aid and a small group of local business people, lack of awareness of CSD, and an underdeveloped stakeholder relationship. All of these constraints are embedded within the socio-cultural and political history of Bangladesh. NGO executives believe strongly in action rather than words. They suggest that corporations need to engage in social development and to improve their social performance in order to meet their social and environmental responsibilities to the Bangladeshi people.

Keywords:

• Corporate Social Disclosure
• Non-Governmental Organisations
• Bangladesh

Acknowledgments

The author gratefully acknowledges the thoughtful suggestions received from Dr. Ataur Rahman Belal on an earlier version of the paper. The author is thankful to Professor Robert Grey, Professor Carol Adams and all other participants of the IPA 2009 and APIRA 2010 conferences for their thorough comments which have greatly improved the paper. The author is also thankful to anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions which have helped the author to improve the quality of the paper.

Notes

1 Generally, NGOs are self-governing independent voluntary organisations that are formally registered by state agencies. They have some shared interest or value, and always aim to provide public benefits (Arenas et al., 2009; Salamon et al., 2000).

2 The Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC) was established by Sir Fazle Hasan Abed in 1972. After its establishment BRAC grew so rapidly that it now has branches in every district of Bangladesh. Moreover, BRAC operates programmes, such as microfinance and education, in nine countries across Asia and Africa, reaching more than 110 million people (www.brac.net).

3 The NGO Affairs Bureau is a government organisation which regulates NGOs and is involved with registering, supporting and assisting NGO activities in Bangladesh.

4 It was evident prior to the 1991 election that, along with other political parties, an influential NGO campaigned against the then ruling party. The ruling party had to resign and call a new election under a neutral government. Another example is conflict over government drug policy between ‘Gonosastha Kendra’ – an NGO ‘caring for peoples health’ and major pharmaceutical multinationals, in the early 1980s (World Bank, 2006).

5 About 50,000 workers, mostly women, are employed in the garment and leather industries in Bangladesh. All of these workers are denied the right to organise, to bargain and to strike, as the government has banned these activities in EPZs in order to lure foreign investors. This is discriminatory in terms of national labour laws (Human, 1999Human Rights for Workers Bulletin, 1999).

6 The EPZ now employs 70,000 workers, mostly in the garment and footwear industries.

7 C Group represents one of the largest private sector industrial conglomerates in Bangladesh. For reasons of anonymity, the actual group name is not disclosed here. Presently, C Group comprises twenty-one companies and employs over 35,000 personnel. It is the first local conglomerate to embrace an international corporate structure. C Group includes jute, textiles, basic chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and ceramics. C Group's non-industrial undertakings are focused on real estate and construction, engineering, media, information technology, trading and financial services.