Tweetjacked: The Impact of Social Media on Corporate Greenwash

We theorize that social media will reduce the incidence of corporate greenwash. Drawing on the management literature on decoupling and the economic literature on information disclosure, we characterize specifically where this effect is likely to be most pronounced. We identify important differences...

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Bibliographic Details
Authors: Lyon, Thomas P. (Author) ; Montgomery, A. Wren (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Springer Science + Business Media B. V 2013
In: Journal of business ethics
Year: 2013, Volume: 118, Issue: 4, Pages: 747-757
Further subjects:B Corporate social responsibility
B Decoupling
B Social media
B Information Disclosure
B Greenwash
B Legitimacy
Online Access: Volltext (JSTOR)
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Summary:We theorize that social media will reduce the incidence of corporate greenwash. Drawing on the management literature on decoupling and the economic literature on information disclosure, we characterize specifically where this effect is likely to be most pronounced. We identify important differences between social media and traditional media, and present a theoretical framework for understanding greenwash in which corporate environmental communications may backfire if citizens and activists feel a company is engaging in excessive self-promotion. The framework allows us to draw out a series of propositions regarding the impact of social media on corporate decisions whether to greenwash, and what channels to use for environmental communication. We conclude with a number of suggestions for future research.
ISSN:1573-0697
Contains:Enthalten in: Journal of business ethics
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1007/s10551-013-1958-x