Exploring differences in social disclosures internationally: A stakeholder perspective

Country of origin is considered to be an important determinant of the level and type of corporate social disclosure. In this paper, we use stakeholder theory to explain differences in social disclosure among countries. We argue that the manner in which the role of a corporation and its stakeholders is defined in a society will affect the extent and quality of corporate social disclosure (CSD) in annual reports. Our findings based on a content analysis of 1998 and 1999 annual reports for 32 Norwegian/Danish companies and 26 US companies in the electric power generation industry, lend support to the stakeholder explanation for observed international differences in CSD.