Determinants Of Voluntary Assurance On Corporate Social Responsibility Reports: An Empirical Analysis

Under the guidance of harmonious society and sustainable developmentstrategic thought,the number of corporate social responsibility report released is ingrowing,voluntary external assurance on corporate social responsibility report ispaid more and more attention.However,the market for assurance service in this areais in its formative stages in China,there is a limited understanding of the demand forthis emergent non-financial auditing practice.In this context,the present article willascertain the determining factors of the demand for voluntary external assurance ofChina’s listed corporation by theoretical and empirical analysis to provide someuseful reference for promoting the development of assurance on CSR reports inChina.In this paper, we use the A shares of listed corporation releasing corporatesocial responsibility reports in SSE from2010to2013as the object of study.Wefocus on two aspects of the influence factors,the institutional environment andinternal characteristics of the company,to explain the voluntary external assurance ofcorporate social responsibility reports.Our results provide evidence that companiesoperating in provinces that have a higher level of marketization, fewer governmentintervention on economy,higher degree of growth of element market and better legalenvironment are more likely to adopt a sustainability assurance statement.While theprobability of external assurance is low in the area with low marketization.Theresults of this study also indicate that assurance on CSR reports depends on thesize,profitability and industry of the company.The paper explore the influence factors of assurance on corporate socialresponsibility reports innovatively from two aspects of external institutionalenvironment and internal company characteristics.The finds show that it is necessaryto perfect the institutional environmem on one hand and enhance the company’sinternal factors on the other hand to provide external constraint mechanism andinternal dynamic mechanism to promote the development of assurance on corporatesocial responsibility reports in China.