TMU CSR Institute zoom session: Understanding Corporate Public Social and Environmental Disclosure Approaches--In Conversation with Professor Kernaghan Webb

About Corporate Public Social and Environmental Disclosure Approaches

Corporate public social and environmental disclosure approaches (CPSEDAs) are regularly deployed by all three of governments the private sector and civil society in a wide variety of contexts, for a wide diversity of purposes. Issues such as boardroom diversity, climate change, modern slavery in supply chains, conflict minerals, and resource extraction royalty and tax payments are examples of policy contexts where businesses are now expected to be more transparent about their policies, performance and/or other measures undertaken.

But while there is considerable use and variety among CPSEDAs, the one thing they all have in common is that by and of themselves none of them require changes of behaviour -- rather, they just require that information be disclosed. This is in contrast with more conventional command-penalty regulatory approaches which directly compel substantive behaviour on pain of penalty. The fact that CPSEDAs only stimulate transparency but do not directly compel changes in business conduct is arguably the basis for its distinctive "power", but it is also the focal point of many CPSEDA criticisms. To put it bluntly, some view CPSEDAs as an avoidance for what is really needed: namely, compulsory behavioural change in the boardroom, with respect to climate change, with respect to forced labour in corporate supply chains, and so on.

The purpose of this "in conversation" session is to unpack some of the key operational aspects of use of CPSEDAs, so that they can be optimally deployed and implemented for the benefit of governments, the private sector and civil society.

About Professor Kernaghan Webb

Dr. Kernaghan Webb is an Associate Professor in the Toronto Metropolitan University Department of Law and Business, and is the Director of the TMU Institute for the Study of Corporate Social Responsibility. He has considerable experience with innovative approaches to regulation, in his work with government, the private sector and civil society, and as explored and elaborated in his research and publications.

The talk is co-sponsored by the TMU Corporate Social Responsibility Student Society, and the TMU Law and Business Student Association.