Corporate Governance, Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Sustainability: The Moderating Role of Top Management Commitment

Abstract

Today's businesses have moved beyond the traditional view of profit maximization, and now focuses on organizations' contributions to society and the environment, which has resulted in the emergence of corporate social responsibility and corporate sustainability. Despite recent interest in corporate social responsibility and corporate sustainability, there is dearth of studies that have attempted to link corporate social responsibility and corporate sustainability. This study therefore investigates the influence of corporate social responsibility on corporate sustainability with the mediating role of corporate governance. By employing survey questionnaire, data was collected from 397 employees of SMEs in Ghana. Data was analysed via structural equation modelling using Amos 24. The findings of this study indicate mixed relationships between of the various corporate governance indices and the dimensions of corporate social responsibility. Board composition, board size, institutional ownership and CEO- Chair duality had varying influence on economic, environmental and social dimensions of corporate social responsibility. In addition, the moderating role of top management commitment was confirmed for the relationship between environmental dimension of corporate social responsibility and corporate sustainability but was however not confirmed for the economic and environmental dimensions. These results have important implications for theory and for practice. Based on this result, it was concluded that, corporate governance systems exhibit varying their interactions with corporate social responsibility dimensions which may be due to changes in the national and institutional framework as well as economic conditions and the type of industry.