Ali Uyar

• PhD, CMA
• Professor at Excelia Business School

Over the past two decades, numerous research studies have focused on the effect of board characteristics on corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement. However, whether boards favor or oppose aggressive CSR engagement above an optimal level remains to be explored. Thus, we extend prior studies and explore boards’ association with aggressive C...

Purpose-This study aims to focus on the risk-mitigating role of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and examine two governance mechanisms' (board monitoring and chief executive officer (CEO) power) moderating role in this connection. Design/methodology/approach-The authors run fixed-effect panel regression using data covering 13 years, 10 major...

Purpose-This study aims to redirect attention from traditional analyses of environmental performance towards examining firms that exhibit "zero" environmental performance-those that entirely neglect ecological practices. Specifically, it investigates the institutional drivers (i.e. coercive and mimetic pressure) behind the worldwide tendency of fir...

In this study, we first examine the quadratic relationships between the three dimensions of the governance pillar of ESG (board monitoring, shareholders' rights, and CSR strategy) and firm value. Second, we investigate the relationship between these three governance pillar components and firm risk. Third, we examine the moderating effect of board m...

Due to increasing climate change concerns, companies are under pressure from stakeholders, including regulators, consumers, and investors, to integrate environmental initiatives into their sustainable supply chain (SSC). Although an increasing body of research investigates the predictors of the environmental practices of firms, focusing on predicto...

Research Question/Issue: This paper examines the impact of corporate lifecycle on board structure offering insights into how firms evolve and adapt their governance practices over time and across different institutional environments. Research Findings/Insights: Based on a sample of 23,530 firm-year observations from 51 countries over the period 2...

We investigate whether internationalisation is significantly associated with waste management. Secondly, by focusing on two critical board attributes, we investigate whether female and tenured directors help enable internationalised firms' better waste management. We find that more internationalised firms produce more waste; this result is robust t...

Purpose This study draws on financial slack, agency, and critical mass theories to investigate risky firms’ ESG engagement, board gender diversity’s moderating role between firm risk and ESG engagement, market reaction to risky firms’ ESG engagement, and board gender diversity’s role in moderating market reaction to risky firms’ ESG engagement. De...

Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate whether public governance quality (i.e. control of corruption and voice and accountability) and corporate governance strength (i.e. environmental committee existence) are influential in stimulating supply chain transparency and how these two governance characteristics interact in enhancing supply...

Purpose In addition to financial performance, firms are increasingly trying to obtain a social reputation from their corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement within society due to reputational benefits. Thus, the authors seek to highlight two facilitators of social reputation which may help firms realize their targets. Hence, drawing on the...

This study, for the first time, tests the moderating effect of press freedom on the association between e‐government and tax evasion. It aims to suggest policymaking better to combat tax evasion through e‐government and the press. The study sample covers the period between 2002 and 2017 and includes 2202 country‐year records affiliated with 138 cou...

Over 75% of a firm's carbon footprint is attributed to logistics activities and transportation related to the acquisition, production, and distribution of materials and goods. Green supply chain management is considered a way to reduce carbon emissions and address climate change concerns. Accordingly, this study aims to investigate whether sustaina...

Purpose-Despite the extensive body of research on absolute corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance, limited attention has been given to the distinct concepts of optimal and aggressive CSR engagement, as well as their associations with CSR awarding. This study aims to differentiate between optimal and aggressive CSR engagement and examine...

This study assesses whether creditors consider ecological practices (i.e., resource usage, emissions, and eco-innovation) when setting interest rates during loan decisions and whether firm-level contingencies play a role in this relationship. Based on a sample of 38,127 firm-year observations of non-financial firms operating worldwide between 2004...

Purpose-Prior studies mostly tested the association between carbon emissions and firm value in certain contexts. This study aims to advance the existing literature by concentrating on three indicators of greening in corporations namely resource use, emissions and eco-innovation, and examining their value relevance in the stock market at the global...

Purpose-This study investigates CSR reporting's role in debt access and cost of debt with the moderating role of external assurance and GRI adoption in emerging markets. Such an investigation will help facilitate external fund flow to firms in better terms. Design/methodology/approach-We collected data from 16 emerging markets between 2008 and 2019...

Purpose This study aims to investigate whether social reputation via corporate social responsibility (CSR) awarding facilitates access to debt and decreases the cost of debt and whether governance mechanisms moderate this relationship. Design/methodology/approach The sample covers the period between 2002 and 2021, during which CSR award data were...

This study focuses on potential inhibiting and driving factors of corporate social responsibility (CSR) controversies including board monitoring intensity and audit committee quality with a particular focus on risky firms. We draw on agency, resource dependence, and slack financial resources theories to explain this association. Using an internatio...

Purpose Taking advantage of a unique measure of corporate culture obtained from advanced machine learning algorithms, this study aims to explore how corporate culture strength is influenced by board independence, which is one of the most crucial aspects of the board of directors. Because of their independence from the corporation, outside independe...

This study examined the impact of slack financial resources, board characteristics (such as gender diversity, tenure, and skill/expertise), and energy efficiency policies on firms' consumption of renewable energy. Using a dataset of 17,753 observations from 2002 to 2019, we primarily utilized fixed-effects regression, among other methods, for robus...

The primary purpose of this study is to explore the internal drivers (i.e., board monitoring, financial slack, and shareholder‐orientedness) of corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting persistence over the years and to test the value relevance of CSR reporting persistence. We also investigate whether internal factors moderate the relationshi...

This study first investigates emission reduction targeting among polluting firms in the basic materials sector. We assess whether firms that produce a greater amount of carbon emissions are more likely to set emission reduction targets in the basic materials sector. Further, we test whether female directors are influential in moderating between emi...

Although numerous past studies have examined the association between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and firm value, the findings have been inconsistent. This study examines how firm visibility, financial slack, and monitoring affected the relationship between CSR and firm value. We find that CSR performance and its three dimensions, that is,...

Purpose-This study aims to examine the potential threshold effect in the association between corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance and social reputation. Design/methodology/approach-This study includes an international and cross-sector sample covering 41 countries, nine sectors and 45,395 firm-year observations. It applies a parabolic...

Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate the association between sustainability reporting (SR) and firm value considering the moderating effect of audit committee (AC) quality and auditor tenure on this association. Design/methodology/approach The data for the study comprise 41,500 firm-year observations worldwide between 2007 and 2018...

Purpose This study aims to guide firms in emerging markets on whether corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement facilitates their access to debt with the moderation of asset structure and firm performance. Considering the moderating effect analysis, this study explores the substitutive or complementary effect of these two contingencies on CS...

Prior studies have reported an association between corporate waste management practices and certain board attributes, but none have focused on foreign directors. Therefore, we examine foreign directors' contributions to firms' waste management by exclusively focusing on waste reduction and recycling. Furthermore, we explore an important channel thr...

This paper examines corporate social responsibility (CSR) and advertising as two firm visibility channels and tests their complementarity/substitution. The study extends the investigation with moderating variables, including board gender diversity, CSR committees, and financial slack. Using a sample that includes 53,835 firm-year observations world...

Although there is an increasing trend in bibliometric studies in almost all domains including accounting and management, the literature on determinants of research productivity is scarce. Hence, we aim to fill this gap by focusing on the research productivity of nations in accounting and management domains. Specifically, we examine the influence of...

Purpose-This study aims to examine the effect of corporate social responsibility (CSR) adoption on differentiation and cost leadership strategies and how governance structure moderates this CSR-strategy relationship. Design/methodology/approach-The study data were retrieved from Thomson Reuters for non-financial firms between 2013 and 2019, and a...

Drawing on agency, stewardship, and contingency theories, this study examined whether board structure is associated with corporate financial performance and-if so-whether firm size and leverage (i.e., contingencies) moderate this association in the logistics sector. Hence, the study aimed to provide implications for board configuration and performa...

Abstract Purpose Growing social concerns and ecological issues accelerate firms’ environmental, social and governance (ESG) engagement. Hence, this study aims to advance the existing literature by focusing on the interplay between institutional and firm governance mechanisms for greater ESG engagement. More specifically, the authors investigate wh...

Purpose-This study aims to test whether over-investment is associated with environmental, social and governance (ESG) variation (i.e. inequality) across its dimensions, which, if so, would imply the prioritization of the interests of some stakeholders over those of others. Design/methodology/approach-Drawing on a global sample of 29,428 observation...

Purpose This study tests whether corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance is a predictor of the financial sector's financial stability (FS), with the moderation of a sustainability committee. Design/methodology/approach The sample covers financial sector firms included in the Thomson Reuters Eikon database. The analyses are based on 8,840...

This study addressed a gap in the literature by investigating the link between corporate strategy and board composition and how it connects to firm value. Most studies have explored whether board structure predicts firm outcomes rather than the other way around even though firm strategy plays a significant role in structuring the board. The sample...

Although extensive past research has studied the connection between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and firm value, it has rarely discriminated between optimal and excessive CSR. Thus, we addressed this issue by examining whether shareholders punish or reward excessive CSR engagement through the moderating effect of cash flow and firm growth....

Do cost leaders engage with sustainability practices or avoid them to save costs, and do differentiators implement those practices to attract the sympathy of the customers or not? How do shareholders of each strategy follower consider those practices? Answering these questions is the main purpose of this study. We find that while cost leadership is...

This study examined the potential relationship between different facets of firm investment (i.e., sales growth, R&D intensity, and total tangible and intangible assets) and CSR reporting, assurance and GRI adoption. Also, it further explored the conditions under which investing firms can encourage or discourage their CSR transparency. Our sample in...

The purpose of this study is to extend the previous literature on the dividend payout and corporate social responsibility nexus by considering internal and external contingencies. We specifically examine the relationship between dividend payout and corporate social responsibility and whether shareholder friendliness and board monitoring moderate th...

Purpose Exploiting two novel measures of takeover vulnerability and asset redeployability, this paper aims to investigate the effect of the takeover market on redeployable assets. Redeployable assets are those with alternative uses. Asset redeployability is a crucial concept in the literature on investment irreversibility. Design/methodology/appro...

Purpose This study investigated the micro–macro link in the hospitality and tourism (H&T) sector, specifically considering whether the gender diversity, independence and board attendance rates of H&T firms' boards, alongside the moderation effect of board policies, played a significant role in tourism sector performance. Design/methodology/approac...

Purpose-This paper focuses exclusively on the drivers and consequences of Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) adoption in sustainability reports with a particular focus on corporate social responsibility (CSR) mechanisms. Design/methodology/approach-The sample includes 63 countries with 4,625 unique firms in these countries and 29,054 firm-year obser...

Purpose-This study aims to examine the roles of board gender and cultural diversities in driving social sustainability practices through the moderating effect of board structure policies in the logistics and transportation sector. Design/methodology/approach-The authors conducted fixed-effects regression with 2005-2019 data from Thomson Reuters Eik...

Purpose Capitalizing on a unique measure of takeover susceptibility principally based on the staggered implementation of state laws, this study aims to explore the takeover market’s effect on managerial ownership. The market for corporate control, often known as the takeover market, is an important external governance mechanism, whereas managerial...

The crisis period of 2008 triggered European firms to undertake more corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities than during non‐crisis periods in all four dimensions, governance, economic, environmental, and social. The exogenous shock of 2008 significantly reduced European companies' profitability. The crisis period triggered firms to undert...

Purpose-Drawing on legitimacy theory, this study aims to investigate whether the benefits of the external assurance process pass beyond the current period and help firms improve corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance in the subsequent periods. Furthermore, the authors examine whether corporate governance (CG) and firm visibility moderate...

Purpose-This study aims mainly to test the effect of audit committee independence and expertise attributes on corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting, assurance and global reporting initiative (GRI) framework adoption and to investigate how CSR committee existence moderates this main relationship. Design/methodology/approach-The study uses...

Exploiting a novel measure of corporate culture based on cutting-edge machine learning algorithms, we examine how female board representation influences a culture of innovation, and also whether female directors spur innovation culture in the presence of an active takeover market. Our results show that higher board gender diversity improves a corpo...

Purpose Drawing on financial slack resources theory, stakeholder theory and signaling theory, the purpose of this study is to explore the two-way causality between liquidity and corporate social responsibility (CSR) by using the cash conversion cycle (CCC) as liquidity proxy and composite and individual CSR metrics. Design/methodology/approach The...

In this study, drawing on social reputation theory, we focus on the non-financial benefit (social reputation) of ESG engagement via CSR awarding and consider ESG inconsistency. The country-industry-year fixed-effects logistic regression analysis was executed based on the data including 45,395 observations between 2012 and 2019. We find that social...

The lack of a focused study on the nexus of research & development (R&D) intensity, eco-friendly practices, firm value in the energy sector, and the stakeholders' concerns for ecology motivated us to realize this study. The study sample covers the period from 2002 to 2019, resulting in 4,016 firm-year observations affiliated with 43 countries. The...

Drawing on institutional theory, this study tests the effect of government efficiency on tax evasion by considering the mediating role of ethics and control of corruption. The different sources of variables forced us to choose a common time period from 2010 to 2015 as well as a common list of 138 countries in the sample. The results indicated that...

Purpose Drawing on neo-institutional, stakeholder, social contract and contingency theories, the objective of this study is to examine whether cultural values across countries may influence decisions to assure integrated reports. Design/methodology/approach For this purpose, the authors have collected integrated reporting assurance, national cultu...

We provide a worldwide investigation of the role of education in combatting tax evasion with the moderation effect of digitalization. The analysis is based on a data set for 142 countries. We find robust evidence that education quality significantly contributes to mitigating tax evasion. More specifically, quality of overall education, quality of m...

As the financial sector plays a central role in the economic development of the countries, its proper functioning is also important for other sectors. This study tests whether female and independent directors ensure financial stability in the financial firms with the moderating effect of board policies and duality where the Chief Executive Officer...

In this study, we explore whether cost leaders and differentiators assume different positions in terms of corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement. Furthermore, we deepen the investigation by examining whether shareholders appreciate cost leaders or differentiators' CSR engagement which bears implications for the firms and stockholders. The...

This paper aims to discover the thematic structure of the accounting field and to highlight prominent, emerging, and fading themes across periods and regions. This study follows a systematic approach benefiting from co-word analysis through social network analysis and visualisation maps. This analysis considers the keywords presented within 7,250 a...

The objective of this study is to test whether Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index (TTCI) enhances tourism sector development in terms of tourist arrivals, tourism receipts, and the change in both tourist arrivals and tourism receipts. The results found that TTCI main index (Level 1) is positively associated with tourist arrivals but not touri...

The study examines whether e-government services reduce the prevalence of tax evasion. Importantly, the study also investigates whether education quality as captured by three proxies and internet connection in schools strengthens the negative relationship between e-government services and tax evasion. The period covered by the study is confined to...

Purpose Drawing on institutional theory and knowledge spillover, the study aims to examine whether there is a causality relationship between macroeconomic factors and research productivity. Design/methodology/approach The study uses fixed-effects (FE) panel regression analysis, utilizing 1,614 country–year observations and 541,732 citable publicat...

The criticism concerning environmental externalities of the transportation and logistics sector is mounting; hence, the purpose of this study is to investigate whether board gender diversity stimulates eco-friendly practices and to test whether a CSR strategy moderates this relationship in this sector. The data for the study were retrieved from the...

Drawing on slack resources and institutional theories, this study tests the links between liquidity, corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategy, and CSR performance. The results indicate differential effects of liquidity measures on CSR investment. CSR committee and executive CSR compensation individually are significant drivers of higher CSR p...

Drawing on institutional theory, this study tests how the ethical behaviors of firms, in interaction with public officials and through the strength of accountability regulations, influence sustainability reporting practices in the hospitality and tourism (H&T) sector. The results indicate that firms operating in a highly ethical business environmen...

The purpose of this study is two-fold: (i) investigate the association between innovation capacity and tax evasion; (ii) examine the moderating effect of intellectual property rights (IPR) on innovation capacity and tax evasion. Thus, the study provides policy guidance to reduce tax evasion. We collected data for 139 countries from several sources...

Whether shareholders reward/punish risky firms for undertaking corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting practices represents a gap. The analysis yielded diverging results for different financial distress proxies. In the model in which volatility in return on assets was the proxy of firm risk, the findings indicated that shareholders punish r...

Purpose Exploiting an exogenous regulatory shock and a novel measure of asset redeployability, this paper aims to explore the effect of independent directors on asset redeployability. In particular, the authors use an innovative measure of asset redeployability recently developed by Kim and Kung (2016). This novel index has been rapidly adopted in...

The purpose of this study is twofold. First, it tests the association between corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance and firm performance in the tourism, healthcare, and financial sectors. Second, it investigates whether CSR committees moderate this association in those sectors. To achieve these objectives, two proxies for CSR performanc...

Purpose The purpose of this study is to contribute to the debate in the literature about generalist CEOs by exploring the effect of board governance on CEO general managerial ability, focusing on one of the most crucial aspects of the board of directors, board size. Prior research shows that smaller boards constitute a more effective governance mec...

The study tests whether the hospitality and tourism (H&T) sector's corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement supports tourism sector development and investigates whether CSR committee and CEO duality moderate this relationship. The data was retrieved from the Thomson Reuters Eikon and the World Bank databases covering the years between 2002...

Drawing on modernization and institutional theories, this study tests the association between the digitalization of government services and tax evasion via the moderation effect of information and communication technologies (ICTs). The study's sample covers the years between 2006 and 2017 and contains 1677 country-year observations. The results of...

The purpose of this study is primarily to investigate the association between public governance quality and logistics sector performance, and to ascertain whether corporate governance mediates this relationship. Grounding on institutional and agency theories, this study has a novel approach as it focuses on the relationship between public governanc...

The objective of this study is to investigate whether governance quality is associated with the sustainability reporting tendency of public sector organizations. For this purpose, we have collected the sustainability reporting numbers of the public sectors of all countries, Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGIs) data, and other controlling variable...

The main objective of this study was to identify country-specific factors associated with the decision to adopt voluntary assurance on integrated reports, the level of assurance quality, and the choice of assurance provider. The sample for this research comprised all companies registered in the example database of the International Integrated Repor...

Most governments attempt to fight and reduce tax evasion. A dilemma arises about whether policies should encourage the ethical behavior of firms (an informal institution) or strengthen auditing standards (a formal institution). In this study, we provide novel worldwide evidence on the effects of these two factors on tax evasion. Overall, even thoug...

Purpose Theory suggests that the market for corporate control, which constitutes an important external governance mechanism, may substitute for internal governance. Consistent with this notion, using a novel measure of takeover vulnerability primarily based on state legislation, this paper aims to investigate the effect of the takeover market on bo...

Despite the growing importance of responsible behavior in the healthcare sector, research on corporate social responsibility (CSR) in association with board structure is scarce. Hence, the objective of this study is twofold: (1) to test whether a board structure is associated with firm financial and CSR performance and (2) whether the CSR committee...

This study explores the link between institutional quality, ethical behaviors of firms, and market regulations on stock market developments. The dynamic panel regression analysis and moderation analysis with single‐threshold modeling approaches were exploited to test the hypotheses. The results show that overall institutional quality with its six i...

The objective of this article is to investigate the mediating role of the private sector between sustainable stock markets (i.e., the existence of a sustainability index) and the sustainability reporting level of the public sector through spillover theory. The sample of the study consists of 115 country records for 2015 and 2016. The results confir...

This study explores the connections among corporate social responsibility performance, reporting, and external assurance in the hospitality and tourism industry by incorporating the Global Reporting Initiative framework. The originality of the study is that it tests signaling theory and the greenwashing tendency by examining different facets of cor...

This study's objective is twofold: (1) to investigate whether board characteristics predict the existence of a sustainability committee, and (2) to examine whether the establishment of sustainability committees stimulates sustainability reporting, external assurance, and the adoption of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) framework in hospitality...

This study explores the thematic structure of sustainability reports (SRs) of the hospitality and tourism (H&T) industry. The contents of the SRs were analyzed by combining text mining techniques and network analysis. The periodical analysis showed that sustainability reporting in the H&T industry is improving in terms of addressing a higher number...