Is corporate governance relevant to the quality of corporate social responsibility disclosure in large European companies?

Purpose This paper aims to report on the quality of corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure in S disregarding the economic, institutional, political and cultural factors that can play a role in influencing sustainability reporting of the companies. Practical implications Better CSR disclosure leads to the firm having a better image in the society; this, in turn, has implications on firm performance, attracting funds, as well as recruiting and retaining high profile employees. Stakeholders are placing cumulative significance to corporate transparency particularly in the area of CSR. Managers should exert more efforts into not only improving the disclosure of the various facts of CSR but also into using the various media available for disclosure. Companies should take the initiative of establishing a CSR committee to ensure effective formation and implementation of CSR policies and disclosure of CSR activities. Social implications The CRS research itself bears the merit of social implications. Moreover, the findings of this research pave the way for future researches to examine the effect of the adoption of global CSR initiatives and frameworks on the quality of CSR reporting. Originality/value This paper contributes to the CSR disclosure literature by developing a new index that includes all the aspects of CSR and exploring the relation between the rarely explored “presence of sustainability committee” and CSR disclosure, as well as testing a vast number of CSR sub-categories that is not extensively covered in previous studies. Moreover, the paper covers a large sample of companies across 16 European countries, in terms of their stand-alone sustainability reports, dedicated chapters of CSR in annual reports, integrated reports, website CSR information and any attachments/links provided on the websites for further CSR documents, brochures or data sheets.