Abstract
Motivated by the controversy surrounding corporate lobbying and corporate political donations, this study considers voluntary Australian corporate political donation disclosures. The frequency, quality, location and motivation of disclosures are investigated from a Legitimacy Theory perspective.
While Australian corporations must disclose political donations to the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) annually, they are not compelled to disclose this information in either annual reports, or stand-alone reports, or websites. Voluntary disclosures of a sample comprising 164 companies which donated $40,000 or more during the fiscal years 2004, 2005 and 2006 were analysed. In addition, the disclosure practices of all companies within the ASX top 50 were investigated.
For the donor companies, findings were low frequency and quality of voluntary political donation disclosures. Most disclosures were made in annual reports. Evidence supporting Legitimacy theory, is mixed. While the narrative of disclosures and industry characteristics of disclosing companies were consistent with the theory, the lack of disclosure overall suggested that voluntary disclosures of corporate political donations were not a prevalent legitimating device. For the ASX top 50, higher proportions of disclosures were observed. Interestingly, however, for 2004 and 2005, more companies who did not make political donations disclosed this fact compared to donor companies. This suggests that donations may not be considered ‘good news’ by companies.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Critical Perspectives on Accounting |
Subtitle of host publication | an international conference at Baruch College April 25-26, 2008 |
Editors | Tony Tinker |
Place of Publication | New York |
Publisher | City University of New York |
Number of pages | 33 |
Publication status | Published - 2008 |
Event | Critical Perspectives on Accounting Conference - New York Duration: 24 Apr 2008 → 28 Apr 2008 |
Conference
Conference | Critical Perspectives on Accounting Conference |
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City | New York |
Period | 24/04/08 → 28/04/08 |