Directive 2014/95, in force since 2017, is the first European step that requires undertakings to provide mandatory non-financial information. The regulation concerns sustainability information, such as environmental, social, and employee information, human rights, and anti-corruption and bribery matters, and the disclosure of diversity policies for board members. According to the theoretical framework of Integrated Assessment (IA), the study aims to examine the expected impact of the Directive within the analysis of empirical evidence before the mandatory approach. This allows, on the regulatory side, evaluation of the quality of the regulation, therefore, whether the law achieves its policy objectives (i.e., if it fills the gap in the sustainability disclosure) and, on the firms’ side, to identify where companies have to invest to meet the legal requirements. The oil and gas sector is chosen as a sample for the study, because it is one of the most advanced sectors in sustainability disclosure, and if the regulation could impact on this sector, it would be the same for less-informed ones. The findings reveal a fair level of completeness of non-financial information, however, there are some areas that have to be improved to achieve the requirements of the Directive. The results also show the presence of overlap between financial and sustainability reports. In conclusion, the quality of regulation is good because it will also increase sustainability disclosure in an advanced sector, such as oil and gas, even if there is an open point on the location of information; companies in this sector will have to invest more in environmental and employee information in future years to comply with the Directive.

An increasing number of firms in OECD countries are obtaining certification as Socially Responsible. Literature is sensitive in testing whether there is a relation between firm performance and Social Responsibility certification. In order to overcome problems related to the multiplicity of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) definitions and certifications, our work implements a CSR index based on the intersection between two of the three main international indices (Domini 400 Social Index, Dow Jones Sustainability World Index and FTSE4Good Index). By using this database in a panel framework, our work shows that among Corporate Performance Measures (CPF), Market Value Added (MVA) is affected by a firm’s social responsible behaviour and certification. The results support the idea that CSR firms have better long-run performance. Thanks to the reputation effect, they achieve higher sales volumes and profits and a reduction in long-run costs: these effects compensate the costs due to the certification.

The role of public-sector organizations (PSOs) in promoting the agenda of sustainability accounting and accountability is not often adequately considered. In the public sector realm, local governments are close to their communities and thus have a particularly important role to play in the pursuit of sustainability goals. Hence, further research is needed to understand if Local Government Organizations (LGOs) are using reporting tools to promote sustainable development. The empirical data showed that the Sustainability Report (SR) is not being as widely used as in past years. Over time, the majority of Italian municipalities have not initiated or continued sustainability reporting due to some barriers including cost reduction, voluntariness, and low SR effectiveness. The findings suggest the popularity of SRs in Italy is falling and the SR tool appears to be “mere trend reporting based on descriptive indicators leading to decreasing interest from internal and external audiences”. The carrot has been unsuccessful. Perhaps the implementation of mandatory requirements could alternatively be used as a stick.

The article aims to explore the perception of local government (LG) financial officers on the users, the uses, and the utility of the consolidated financial report in Italy, since it was one of the first countries to expressly provide for compulsory adoption. A questionnaire was sent to a statistical stratified sample of LG, collecting 133 responses (response rate 17%). The results, tested through the structural equation model we observe that social legitimization pressure rather than accountability patterns or performance analysis drive more the adoption process. The evidence indicates that the report is perceived as a potential tool for pursuing performance assessment strategies in a group context. However, this potentiality depends on the coordination effort made by the LG. The article finds out the rise of the topic of the public governance and the role of coordinating the local public group.

This paper is based on the consideration that information transparency and accountability are not only related to the increase of spread information but also to the improvement of the organizational clarity with which the information is conveyed through the periodic reports. The development of an effective communicative behaviour is linked to a good use of the periodical reports – the narrative section of the annual report and social, environmental and sustainability reports – with reference to their adequate completeness and integration. Empirical research emphasizes the importance of information increase, e.g. information on products, processes, strategies, risks, social-environmental impacts, intangibles assets, and so on. As to this, in the last years focused reports on specific subjects have increasingly been made public: in this, social, environmental and sustainability reports (SES) have played a very important role. At the same time, content of the annual report has been extended by the introduction of disclosure about social and environmental issues. In such a context, scarce attention was paid to the different reports’ integration and to the possibility that there could be information repetition. More disclosure could be positive for the reduction of information asymmetry but lack of integration of reports and information redundancy could reduce transparency, without being useful for the readers’ knowledge. By means of a disclosure-scoring system, the aim of this paper is the analysis of the relationship between the content of the annual reports and of the SES reports. To quantify the degree of reports’ completeness and integration a disclosure index has been established. Reports of year 2014 have been analysed. To better understand the companies’ communicative behaviour a specific industry is selected. Extractive petroleum companies are analysed because of their relevant environmental and social impact. In addition to this, previous researches demonstrate that petroleum companies have transparent communication behaviour. Finally, there are specific guidelines for their SES reports’ drafting. The analysis will allow the identification of some communication models and will provide possible response in order to combine the need for more information with the communication tools’ integration. This study could also be a first response to evaluate the potentialities and criticalities of the adoption of the integrated reporting.