Corporate Ethical Identity as a Determinant of Firm Performance: A Test of the Mediating Role of Stakeholder Satisfaction

In this article, we empirically assess the impact of corporate ethical identity (CEI) on a firm’s financial performance. Drawing on formulations of normative and instrumental stakeholder theory, we argue that firms with a strong ethical identity achieve a greater degree of stakeholder satisfaction (...

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Bibliographic Details
Authors: Berrone, Pascual (Author) ; Surroca, Jordi (Author) ; Tribó, Josep A. (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Springer Science + Business Media B. V 2007
In: Journal of business ethics
Year: 2007, Volume: 76, Issue: 1, Pages: 35-53
Further subjects:B Business Ethics
B Stakeholder Theory
B stakeholder satisfaction
B corporate ethical identity
B Financial Performance
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Summary:In this article, we empirically assess the impact of corporate ethical identity (CEI) on a firm’s financial performance. Drawing on formulations of normative and instrumental stakeholder theory, we argue that firms with a strong ethical identity achieve a greater degree of stakeholder satisfaction (SS), which, in turn, positively influences a firm’s financial performance. We analyze two dimensions of the CEI of firms: corporate revealed ethics and corporate applied ethics. Our results indicate that revealed ethics has informational worth and enhances shareholder value, whereas applied ethics has a positive impact through the improvement of SS. However, revealed ethics by itself (i.e. decoupled from ethical initiatives) is not sufficient to boost economic performance.
ISSN:1573-0697
Contains:Enthalten in: Journal of business ethics
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1007/s10551-006-9276-1