Purpose: – The purpose of this paper is to assess if online interaction through social media, particularly Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, represents an effective stakeholder engagement mechanism in order to define the contents of social, environmental, or sustainability reporting (SESR).Design/methodology/approach: – After examining 332 worldwide sustainability reports for the year 2013, drawn up according to the guidelines provided by the Global Reporting Initiative, the authors conducted a content analysis on the Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube pages of the organisations who rely on these types of social media. This was done in order to assess the scope of interaction between the organisation and its stakeholders.Findings: – The authors found that a small number of organisations use social media to engage stakeholders as a means of defining the contents of SESR, and that the level of interaction is generally low. Rather than assuming a deliberative approach that is aimed at forging a democratic consensus on how to address specific corporate social responsibility or SESR issues, these types of interaction focus on gathering divergent socio-political views in an agonistic perspective.Research limitations/implications: – Further research could complement this exploratory research with statistical analyses. It could focus on how comments/replies by users are used by organisations and examine the impacts of SESR on companies’ performances.Originality/value: – The authors contribute to the literature on social accounting by understanding whether social media can be reliable instruments of stakeholder engagement and by examining the relevance of information that is voluntarily disclosed by corporations in SESR.

Purpose: – The purpose of this paper is to provide insight into the companies’ motivations to issue or not issue voluntary standalone corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports in the Canadian context.Design/methodology/approach: – The authors realized a questionnaire survey that asked Canadian companies why they do or do not issue standalone CSR reports, what their motivations and costs are, and the extent to which they comply with GRI guidelines.Findings: – The results show that larger firms issue standalone CSR reports. As larger firms have more political visibility and are subject to greater external scrutiny than smaller firms (Watts and Zimmerman, 1986), the findings indicate that firms primarily issue standalone CSR reports in response to external scrutiny by stakeholders, which is consistent with a stakeholder perspective. The survey also identifies that ancillary motivations for Canadian firms for issuing standalone CSR reports are consistent with legitimacy and signalling perspectives.Research limitations/implications: – The authors acknowledge that the generalizability of the findings is limited due to the sample being situated within a single national context. The inferences drawn from such a sample in Canada may not be applicable to other countries with different national institutional contexts. In addition, the small size of the sample may limit the generalizability of the findings. The authors also did not specifically consider the quality of the CSR reports in the study. Finally, the work may be affected by the inherent weaknesses associated with survey research, including the inherent bias of the individuals responding to the survey.Originality/value: – The research adds to the growing body of research on voluntary CSR disclosures, with particular reference to the Canadian context.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the utilization of the social network, Facebook, as an instrument of stakeholder engagement and dialogic accounting in American charitable foundations, specifically non-profit organizations that are dedicated to philanthropy. Design/methodology/approach: The research motivation involves whether online interaction through Facebook could represent a channel of dialogic accounting that engages organizational stakeholders. This paper aims to understand if this dialogue is geared to generate a consensus necessary to deliberate over decisions that are shared between all stakeholders, or if a divergent and agonistic perspective, which highlights struggles and differences between actors, prevails. The present study employs a form of content analysis that takes into account the Facebook pages of the 100 largest American philanthropic foundations. Findings: The primary goal of the analysis is to examine the discrepancies in terms of how (and how much) large organizations are using Facebook. The study wants to provide more details on which kind of information large organizations are willing to disclose and collect on Facebook, and to evaluate the level and type of interaction between foundations and users. Research limitations/implications: Further research could build on the present study by providing in-depth case studies and extending the analysis to other social media and other types of organizations. Originality/value: Social media represent a powerful mechanism to engage stakeholders in a polylogic conversation. However, the scholarly literature confirms that further studies are necessary to understand how companies and organization can exploit this potential.