Corporate Social Responsibility Reporting of two Note-issuing Banks in Hong Kong

The environmental performance and management disclosure of organisations came underincreased scrutiny over the past decade due to several factors, particularly the impactorganisations have on the world’s environment and the rapid change in the world’s climate.These concerns prompted organisations, including financial institutions, to review the level oftheir environmental performance and management disclosures to demonstrate, amongst otherobjectives, their level of social responsibility. Due to the nature of their business, financialinstitutions are not generally seen to contribute directly to the degradation of the environment;however, they do provide the funds for many organisations’ projects which directly affect theenvironment.This paper reviews the environmental performance and management disclosuredevelopments in China specifically by two note-issuing banks in Hong Kong: the Hongkongand Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) and the Bank of China (Hong Kong) Limited(BOCHK) from 2003 to 2006. The review is conducted with reference to the EquatorPrinciples, a voluntary environmental performance framework developed specifically forfinancial institutions. The paper also contributes to the literature on legitimation theory, usinga social constructionalist perspective of legitimation.