Impacts of Mega-events on Sustainability Reporting Practices: The Chinese Banking Sector

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify and determine how the mega-events in 2008 (Global Financial Crisis, Beijing Summer Olympic Games and Sichuan Earthquake) influenced the contents of a Chinese banks’ sustainability reporting and the impact of this on their legitimacy. Design/methodology/approach: Content analysis is used to analyze the disclosed sustainability indicators of ten banks operating in China, including: state-owned banks, joint-stock commercial banks, Chinese subsidiaries of foreign owned banks and policy banks. The theoretical framework is informed by legitimacy theory. Findings: The results indicate that a unified disclosure model cannot be identified in Chinese bank’s sustainability reports. To date, disclosure of mega-event related issues and other sustainability performance issues differs across institutions. This paper suggests that different levels of disclosure output in relation to mega-events, especially the Sichuan Earthquake, can potentially gain legitimacy or, in-contrast, constitute a legitimacy gap, depending on the contents disclosed.