Purpose This study aims to investigate whether board gender diversity and sustainability performance influence tax avoidance. Design/methodology/approach The study is based on a sample consisting of 300 UK firms over the 2005-2017 period. This study is motivated by structural equations and system models that specify both a direct and an indirect link between board gender diversity and tax avoidance. Findings The results show that the level of tax avoidance decrease when the level of women on the board increase. Therefore, we find that sustainability performance is generally associated with greater tax avoidance. In combination, the results suggest that board gender diversity and sustainability performance play a significant role in corporate tax avoidance. Practical implications The findings may be of interest to the academic researchers, investors and regulators. For academic researchers, it is interested in discovering board gender diversity, sustainability performance and tax avoidance. For investors, the results show that the existence of female directors on the board reduces the tax avoidance. For regulators, the results advise the worldwide policy makers to give the importance of female roles to improve the engagement firms in sustainability reporting. Originality/value This study extends the existing literature by examining the mediating effect of sustainability performance on the relationship between board gender and tax avoidance in the UK context.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the direct and indirect links between corporate governance and tax avoidance using corporate social responsibility (CSR). Design/methodology/approach This study is based on a sample consisting of 300 UK and 200 French firms over the period 2005-2017. This study is motivated by structural equations and system models that specify both a direct link and an indirect link between corporate governance and tax avoidance. Findings The results show that CSR fully mediates the relationship between corporate governance and tax avoidance in UK firms. In addition, in French firms, CSR partially mediates the relation between corporate governance and tax avoidance. Practical implications The findings may be of interest to the academic researchers, practitioners and regulators who are interested in discovering corporate governance score, tax avoidance and CSR. Regulators must evaluate their actual corporate governance mechanisms and their country’s legal system before mandating additional governance mechanisms for firms in their country. Social implications This study proved empirically that firms with a higher level of social responsibility are better positioned to obtain more transparency through reducing tax avoidance. Originality/value This paper extends the existing literature by examining the mediation effect of CSR on the relationship between tax avoidance and corporate governance.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine how women in board represent moderates the relationship between audit quality and corporate tax avoidance. Design/methodology/approach The study is based on a sample consisting of 270 UK firms over the 2005–2017 period. This study is motivated by moderating regression analysis. Findings The results show that audit quality influences the corporate tax avoidance. Audit quality measured by two proxies audit specialization and audit fees has a negative effect on corporate tax avoidance. Board gender diversity “BGD” moderates the relationship between audit quality and tax avoidance. The impact of the BGD level increases as the presence of woman in the board escalated from 40 to 60 percent but, then, weakens at 10 percent level. Practical implications The findings may be of interest to the academic researchers, practitioners and regulators who are interested in discovering relation between audit quality and tax avoidance with the presence of woman in the board. This study should be of interest to tax policymakers concerned about declining corporate tax revenues. Originality/value This paper extends the existing literature by examining the moderating effect of BGD on the relation between audit quality and corporate tax avoidance using the sensitivity analysis.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the direct and indirect links between corporate governance and sustainability performance using corporate social responsibility. Design/methodology/approach The study is based on a sample consisting of 300 UK firms over the 2005–2017 period. This study applied structural equations models that specify both a direct and an indirect link between corporate governance and sustainability performance. Findings The authors find that corporate governance has a positive effect on sustainability performance. In addition, this study shows that corporate social responsibility fully mediates the relationship between corporate governance and sustainability performance in UK firms. Practical implications This study shows that firms are invited to engage more in sustainability performance and corporate social responsibility activities, which reduces agency conflicts between managers and shareholders. Originality/value To the authors’ knowledge, no research studies examined empirically the direct and indirect relationship between corporate governance and sustainability performance. Therefore, the main contribution of this research is to show how corporate governance effectiveness leads to higher corporate social responsibility level and sustainability performance using two analyses methods (mediator analysis and multiple mediator analysis).

Cet article vise à examiner empiriquement comment la performance durable modère la relation entre l’évasion fiscale et la RSE par le biais de la diversité du genre au sein des conseils d’administration. La modélisation par équation structurelle est appliquée pour tester la relation entre la performance durable, la RSE et l’évasion fiscale pour un ensemble de données de panel de 300 entreprises britanniques répertoriées au cours de la période 2005-2017. Les résultats montrent que la performance durable modère la relation entre l’évitement de l’impôt et la RSE. Ainsi, cette étude démontre empiriquement que les entreprises ayant des activités de performance durable sont mieux placées pour obtenir plus de transparence en réduisant l’évasion fiscale. L’originalité de cet article consiste à proposer la mise en place de liens directs et indirects entre performance durable, RSE et évasion fiscale.