Drivers of corporate social responsibility disclosure in Malaysian government-linked companies / Nurulayuni Ahmad Jemadi

The implementation of Government-Linked Company (GLC) Transformation Program 2005/06 by government is one effort to promote Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) disclosures among its government-linked companies (GLCs). CSR issues are being stressed in the Silver Book included in the GLC Transformation Manual under the GLC Transformation Program 2005/06. It is questionable as to whether the introduction of the Silver Book really reflects goods prospects for government-linked companies to disclose their CSR, and whether there are any other factors that will influence the GLCs in Malaysia to disclose their CSR. This dissertation aims to examine whether the introduction of the Silver Book affect the CSR disclosure among Malaysian GLCs as well as to examine the drivers. The independent variables involved are the firm characteristics (profitability, leverage and share return) and corporate governance characteristics (board size, board independence and board gender diversity), while dependent variable is CSR disclosure. Multiple linear regression analysis is being used to examine the relationship between all the independent variables and dependent variable. Findings show that there is an increasing trend in CSR disclosure among Malaysian GLCs from year 2007 until 2011. Only two variables i.e. board size and board independence has been found to have a significant positive relationship with the CSR disclosure. This dissertation gives implications to various parties such as Malaysian Government, Bursa Malaysia, Security Commission and other relevant parties in to improve CSR awareness, practices, disclosures and quality in GLCs.