Board gender diversity and carbon emissions: European evidence on curvilinear relationships and critical mass

Abstract

The role of European businesses in addressing environmental issues and climate change has taken center stage with the European Green Deal. With increasing attention to the effect of board gender diversity (BGD) on firms' environmental performance, the question arises whether BGD has any influence on carbon emissions.Based on legitimacy and critical mass theory, this study empirically investigates the impact of BGD on firms' carbon performance (CP), based on total carbon emissions intensity. The paper relies on two-stage least squares (2SLS) regressions with instrumental variable (IV) and a two-step generalized method of moments (GMM) system approach to analyze a cross-country sample of 3123 observations from non-financial firms in the European STOXX600 index over the 2009-2018 period. Our findings add to the growing empirical evidence twofold: (1) there is a robust linear and positive relationship between BGD and CP, whereas some indication of a U-shaped relationship is found; and (2) we find that a critical mass of at least two women directors needs to be reached to increase CP. Our research results contribute to the current discussion on sustainable corporate governance, especially in the European capital market, and have implications for researchers, business practice, and regulatory issues alike.

Does financial performance moderate the relationship between board attributes and corporate social responsibility in French firms?

“…Previous studies have excessively analyzed the influence of board gender diversity on firm CSR performance and disclosure (Beji et al, 2020;Byron and Post, 2016;Dwekat et al, 2020;Nuber and Velte, 2021). They concluded that the presence of female directors in the boardroom can improve monitoring capacity of the board.…”

“…Several empirical studies have shown an increased interest in analyzing the relationship between board attributes and CSR policies (Gerged, 2021;Karim et al, 2019;Zubeltzu-Jaka et al, 2020;Khan et al, 2021;El-Bassiouny et al, 2020;Nwude and Nwude, 2021;Al Fadli, 2020;Fatma and Chouaibi, 2021;Chintrakarn et al, 2021;Govindan et al, 2021;Beji and al., 2020;Nuber and Velte, 2021;Ardito et al, 2020;Yarram and Adapa, 2021;Barnea and Rubin, 2010;De Villiers et al, 2011;Campanella et al, 2021). However, these studies yielded inconsistent findings (Dwekat et al, 2020;Endrikat et al, 2020).…”

Environmental Performance of the Tourism Sector from a Gender Diversity Perspective

“…Based on these arguments, several studies have confirmed the need for representation of at least three women on the board in order for their presence to contribute positively to socially responsible actions [69] such as environmental initiatives and programmes [70]. However, some scholars disagree, reporting that reaching a critical mass of two women is sufficient to reduce GHG emissions [71] and ensure greater environmental innovation [72].…”

“…The results for the relationship of interest are also shown. [27,47,85,89] Use of resources [27,71,85] Emissions [19,47,72,85,[90][91][92] Environmental innovation [30,31,93,94] Environmental performance Negative relationship [87] Consumption of water and energy [95] Environmental innovation [28,34,[96][97][98][99][100][101][102][103][104][105][106] Environmental performance No relationship [29] Consumption of energy [27,85] Environmental innovation Source: authors, based on the literature review.…”

Women in top echelon positions and their effects on sustainability: a review, synthesis and future research agenda

“…García-Sánchez et al, 2020b;Valls Martínez et al, 2020), of which 9 studies focusing only on European contexts (e.g. Ben Fatma & Chouaibi, 2021; Gangi et al, 2021;Nuber & Velte, 2021). 132 studies analyse the data of only one country; the most considered countries are geographically distributed and include: United States (26 studies), China (15 studies), Australia (12 studies), Spain (11 studies), Malaysia (7 studies), United Kingdom (7 studies), France (7 studies), Bangladesh (6 studies), Pakistan (5 studies), Italy (5 studies), Canada (4 studies).…”