Ethical environment, accountability, and sustainability reporting: What is the connection in the hospitality and tourism industry?

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 firms established in environments characterized by high accountability are more likely than low accountability environments to issue a sustainability report, which implies a complementary effect between the strength of the accountability and the firms’ sustainability disclosures. This verifies that the weakness or strength of informal and formal institutional forces exert considerable influence on firms’ desire to carry out sustainability reporting. However, this influence is not true of the acquisition of external assurance statements and following Global Reporting Initiative guidelines, with which accountability has a negative and insignificant association, respectively.