A Study of Stakeholders’ Positioning on Information Materiality and Accountability in the Integrated Report

Abstract

Objective: The objective in this study is to identify, in an individualized manner, the position each participant adopts in the elaboration process of the Integrated Report (IR) during the Consultation Draft phase and if this positioning is similar to that adopted by others who identified themselves similarly. Method: 224 comment letters were read, which were coded according to the positioning and justification each sender presented. Chi-square statistics were used to determine the association between senders and the independence among different groups. Results: The results found show that the stakeholders, except for the financial capital providers, tended to disagree from the concept of materiality suggested by the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC). It was verified that most companies did not resist, taking on responsibility for the information disseminated in the IR. Contributions: This study identified that the IR was elaborated to respond to the investors, pushing the interests of groups more focused on sustainability into second place, as the other stakeholders were not represented, as the integration the IR aims for was not considered as something broad, which is why, in principle, it would not demand great operational changes from the companies to accept the IR.