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The Communication of Corporate Social Responsibility Practices Through Social Media Channels Corporate Board: Role, Duties & Composition / Volume 14, Issue 1, 2018 THE COMMUNICATION OF CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY PRACTICES THROUGH SOCIAL MEDIA CHANNELS Silvia Testarmata *, Fabio Fortuna **, Mirella Ciaburri *** * Corresponding author, Niccolò Cusano University, Italy; Contact details: Niccolò Cusano University, Via Don Carlo Gnocchi, n. 3, 00166 Rome, Italy ** Niccolò Cusano University, Italy *** LUISS University, Italy Abstract How to cite this paper: Testarmata, S., Corporations are rapidly expanding their use of social media in Fortuna, F., & Ciaburri, M. (2018). The corporate disclosure, and many firms are now entering into a communication of corporate social virtual dialogue with stakeholders to communicate their responsibility practices through social media channels. Corporate Board: Role, economic, social and environmental impacts on society. However, Duties and Composition, 14(1), 34-49. the use of social media as a form of dissemination in http://doi.org/10.22495/cbv14i1art3 communicating corporate social responsibility still remains an under-investigated research topic. Stemming from these Copyright © 2018 The Authors considerations, the purpose of the paper is to analyse how companies are using social media platforms to disclose the This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial corporate social responsibility practices in order to engage 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). stakeholders in compelling and on-going virtual dialogs, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b comparing how Socially Responsible and Not Socially Responsible y-nc/4.0/ companies use social media platforms to communicate their corporate social responsibility initiatives and interventions. The ISSN Online: 2312-2722 analysis supports the current calls for innovative forms for ISSN Print: 1810-8601 corporate disclosure and provides empirical evidence on the Received: 26.02.2018 corporate use of social media for communicating CSR practices, Accepted: 05.04.2018 using a sample of Italian Listed companies. JEL Classification: M14, M40, L00, Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility, Corporate Q01, C01 Communication, Corporate Disclosure, Social Media, Italian Listed DOI: 10.22495/cbv14i1art3 Companies 1. INTRODUCTION & Taylor, 2016; Stohl, Etter, Banghart & Woo, 2017; Tench & Jones, 2015). A growing public awareness of social, environmental Even though the growing use of these and humanitarian issues has contributed to innovative disclosure forms by corporations has increasing stakeholders’ expectations regarding been highlighted in the business press and corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices and documented in surveys (KPMG, 2013; Harvard the disclosure of their impacts on society. Business Review, 2010; Larcker, Larcker & Tayan, Companies are expected to manage effectively the 2012) and some empirical analyses about the social and environmental dimensions of business corporate adoption of social media to foster CSR activities and to be accountable for their CSR practices have been made (e.g. Abitbol & Lee, 2017; practices keeping stakeholders informed of CSR Castelló, Etter & Årup Nielsen, 2016; Gruber, initiatives and projects (Dutot, Lacalle Galvez & Kaliauer & Schlegelmilch, 2017; Jamali, Moshabaki & Versailles, 2016; Pistoni, Songini & Perrone, 2016). Kordnaeij, 2016; Jurietti, Mandelli & Fudurić, 2017; Due to this growing demand for transparency, the Kim & Rader, 2010; Reilly & Hynan, 2014; Reilly & importance of the CSR communication has Weirup, 2010), an extensive analysis of the use of considerably increased in recent years (Del Bosco, social media channels for communicating CSR 2017; Go & Bortree, 2017; Lee, 2016). In addition, the initiatives in Italy is still missing. internet has become recognized as a relevant To date, studies on the communication of CSR channel for enhancing and fostering relations practices in Italian listed companies have mainly between companies and the stakeholders (Waters, paid attention to the effect of CSR on financial Burnett, Lammb & Lucas, 2009), and social media performance (e.g. Fiori, Di Donato & Izzo, 2007) and channels are becoming an important tool used to the quality of CSR reporting (e.g. Fossati, Luoni & communicate CSR initiatives and interventions (Kent Tettamanzi, 2009; GBS, 2013; Manetti & Bellucci, 2016; Romolini, Fissi & Gori, 2014) whereas another stream of research has focused on the sustainability 34 Corporate Board: Role, Duties & Composition / Volume 14, Issue 1, 2018 reporting in public administrations (e.g. Farneti, according to the European Commission perspective, Guthrie & Siboni, 2011). To the current authors’ we view CSR as “the responsibility of enterprises for knowledge, scholars have paid scant attention to the their impacts on society” (EU, 2011b, p. 6) based on issue of CSR communication through social media in which, responsible companies should maximize the Italy (Del Bosco, 2017; Tuan & Moretti, 2017). On the value creation for its stakeholders and identify, other hand, because Social Media have created a host prevent and mitigate the adverse effects of their of opportunities to interact and to have a dialogue actions on the environment. The CSR with and among a great number of stakeholders, conceptualization of the European Commission there have been growing calls for managers to learn highlights the importance of stakeholders, the need how to improve the effectiveness of CSR to create value for them as well as to respond to communication through social media channels environmental or institutional pressures so that (Saxton, Gomez, Ngoh, Lin & Dietrich, 2017; Stohl et firms are beneficial to society. al., 2017; Tench & Jones, 2015; Uzunoğlu, Türkel & The theoretical foundation of this approach can Yaman Akyar, 2017; Vo, Xiao & Ho, 2017; Zizka, be found in the residual view of CSR. This point of 2017). view “conceptualizes CSR as a residual (i.e. Thus, the research aims to explore the use of nonstrategic) activity, summarized by the “giving social media channels to communicate CSR back to society” proposition, that is, the idea that practices. In order to do so, the study examines the there is a moral obligation and/or a number of good corporate use of Facebook and Twitter to analyse practical reasons for corporations to give back to the content and the scope of these forms of society some of the value they have created” information dissemination. In turn, the research (Freeman et al., 2010, p. 257). Indeed, the European compares the differential use of social media approach to CSR strategies is characterized by a channels for corporate communication of a sample culture of a collective effort on the part of the of Italian Listed Companies, by dividing the sample business to better society (Matten & Moon, 2008). into two subsamples: Socially Responsible and Not Under this view of CSR, the firm exists to benefit Socially Responsible companies. This categorization society and the redistribution of profits is seen as a is based on a reliable outside rating such as means to improving society. In turn, responsible Standard Ethics Rating that provides sustainability companies are expected to “add on” a social role to ratings of firms’ compliance in the field of CSR business, making their business activities according to the European Union, the OECD and the sustainable and being accountable for their CSR United Nations guidelines and covers a wide range of practices (Dutot et al., 2016; Pistoni et al., 2016). the major European companies. According to the triple bottom line approach The remainder of this paper is structured as (Elkington, 1997), corporate sustainability is follows. Section 2 describes and justifies the use of conceptualized as a process of permanent social media channels to communicate CSR improvement towards a balance of economic, social, initiatives and outlines our research propositions. and environmental goals and values. Thus, based on Section 3 describes the sample composition and the this view, CSR outcomes encompass economic, social research method adopted for collecting and and environmental dimensions. Economic selecting data on the use of social media platforms. responsibility references a company’s contribution Section 4 proposes a critique of the corporate use of to the on-going viability of the larger economic social media channels for communicating CSR system. Social responsibility considers the practices through descriptive statistics and an company’s impact on the local communities in analysis of the research results. Section 5 offers our which it operates, ranging from corporate arguments on the use of social media as a form of philanthropy to providing safe working conditions. dissemination in communicating CSR practices and Environmental responsibility regards a company’s presents several relevant unanswered research effect on the physical environment. questions. The final section provides some closing Accordingly to this approach, many responsible remarks and the limitations of our analysis. investing companies and leading index providers use this theoretical framework to evaluate the 2. LITERATURE REVIEW companies’ sustainability practices, focusing on economic, social and environmental factors that are 2.1. The meaning of CSR relevant to the companies’ success. For example, RobecoSAM is an investment specialist focused exclusively on sustainability investing that every CSR has become a well-established concept whereby year assesses the world’s largest companies via its companies
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