The role of female directors in promoting CSR practices: An international comparison between family and non‐family businesses

Abstract

This article analyzes a panel of 550 international firms, for the period 2004 to 2010, to compare the role of female directors in family and non-family firms in promoting responsible practices.Many studies have associated the presence of women on the board with a higher degree of socially responsible commitment. However, we found that this is much less so in family firms than in non-family firms. In family firms, corporate social responsibility (CSR) commitment does not vary significantly with the presence of female directors, as the latter tend to behave in accordance with the family orientation toward CSR. This orientation depends on the stakeholders being addressed, with greater social responsibility shown toward external stakeholders than internal ones.

Board gender diversity and corporate environmental performance: The moderating role of family and dual‐class majority ownership structures

“…In pursuing the goal of advancing environmental CSR, family owners may strengthen their control on the company by deliberately selecting directors that help reinforce their sought for positive impact (or reduced negative impact) on firms' environmental performance. Women directors, especially when they present family ties, are often seen as “family delegate” who care more about protecting family's interests through corporate decisions (Abdullah, ) and are more influenced by family's values in their decision making (Rodríguez‐Ariza, Cuadrado‐Ballesteros, Martínez‐Ferrero, & García, ). Given this, in the case of boards with a greater proportion of women directors, corporate decisions would be more likely to be taken prioritizing the wishes of the family members, in particular when such decisions overlap with women directors' preference towards an issue such as environmental protection.…”

“…and are more influenced by family's values in their decision making (Rodríguez-Ariza, Cuadrado-Ballesteros,Martínez-Ferrero, & García, 2017). Given this, in the case of boards with a greater proportion of women directors, corporate decisions would be more likely to be taken prioritizing the wishes of the family members, in particular when such decisions overlap with women directors' preference towards an issue such as environmental protection.As women directors have been viewed as paying more attention to the welfare of the natural environment and other external stakeholders(Krüger, 2009;Li et al, 2017;Lu & Herremans, 2019;Post et al, 2015;Walls et al, 2012), family owners would expect women directors to be sympathetic to family's interests in the case of an environmental CSR agenda and thus, if appointed, to use their influence on the board to bring this agenda about.…”

Does corporate social responsibility affect tax avoidance: Evidence from family firms

“…Among the ample range of possibilities, in our study, the explanatory variable of ownership concentration is taken as "Family," a dummy variable (Kashmiri & Mahajan, 2010;Landry et al, 2013) that takes the value 1 if the largest shareholder is a family member with more than 20% of the votes and 0 otherwise Martínez-Ferrero et al, 2016;Rodríguez-Ariza, Cuadrado-Ballesteros, Martínez-Ferrero, & García-Sánchez, 2017). A dichotomous measure of family control has been used in numerous family business studies (Berrone et al, 2012;Steijvers & Niskanen, 2014).…”

Justice versus fairness in the family business workplace: A socioemotional wealth approach

“…However, the pursuit of socioemotional goals in family firms adds important considerations when discussing justice and fairness in the workplace (Gomez‐Mejia, Neacsu, & Martin, ; Rodríguez‐Ariza, Cuadrado‐Ballesteros, Martínez‐Ferrero, & García‐Sánchez, ; Samara et al, ; Williams et al, ). Achieving socioemotional goals, such as maintaining family harmony and unity and preserving family bonds, have at least equal importance in family firms as achieving economic goals (Chrisman, Chua, Pearson, & Barnett, ; Gomez‐Mejia et al, ; Samara et al, ).…”