The great slowdown? Trajectories of sustainability reporting boundary change from a value chain perspective 1990–2020

Purpose As sustainability has become an increasingly urgent and critical challenge, firms have faced growing expectations to broaden the scope of accountability by extending their sustainability reporting boundaries. This article analyses sustainability boundary change from a value chain perspective across different phases of sustainability reporting. Design/methodology/approach We analysed sustainability boundaries, i.e. the extent to which a firm accounts for impacts across its own operations and wider value chain, in a single value chain of steel-adjacent firms in Sweden, using a firm- and value chain-level assessment framework developed in the article. Reports from 1990, 2000, 2010 and 2020 were analysed qualitatively and quantitatively to identify boundary trajectories based on an institutional theory framing. Findings Boundaries expanded significantly between 1990 and 2020; however, this trajectory slowed between 2010 and 2020 as sustainability reporting became stabilised as a practice, with extensions primarily occurring upstream rather than downstream or societally. No firms were found to use holistic reporting by including a full value chain perspective. Research limitations/implications Firm-centric reporting is shown to be the dominant approach over time; this sits in tension with mounting expectations to report on sustainability topics more broadly. It is suggested that future studies explore other institutional contexts, countries and value chain configurations to support and expand on the findings. Studies on a more granular level than the 10-year increments used in this study could also reveal nuances of boundary extension over time. Originality/value We distinguish between scope and depth, two dimensions of sustainability boundaries, to develop a framework of boundary approaches: firm-limited reporting, insular reporting, value chain aware reporting and holistic reporting. Based on these, we identify opportunities and challenges for adopting a value chain perspective in sustainability reporting, noting that, while the number of topics (i.e. depth) can be increased by using reporting frameworks like Global Reporting Initiative, incorporating topics at the value chain level (i.e. scope) remains a key challenge for firms due to the firm-centric logic used in both financial and sustainability reporting.