Linking Corporate Reputation and Accountability: Antecedents, Mechanisms, Paradoxes, and Outcomes

Accountability refers to the state of being liable and answerable to someone for something. It establishes relationships, defines ‘‘the rights of society (or groups/stakeholders within society) and relates to the rights that emerge from the relationship between the accountable organization (the accountor) and the accountee’’ (Gray, Bebbington, & Collison, 2006). Being accountable requires the object of accountability to be capable of being observed, monitored, and evaluated through its willingness to provide reliable information. There must, as well, be clear consequences for failure (Carroll, 2016). In business, accountability has been equated with governance (Brennan & Solomon, 2008) and corporate social responsibility reporting (Gray, et. al., 1997; Newell, 2005; Valor, 2005; Bendell, 2005; Utting, 2008). Scholars have also investigated the role of intermediaries and gatekeepers, such as auditors and credit rating agencies, in upholding - or failing to uphold - corporate accountability (Coffee, 2002; Partnoy, 1999). Yet despite these recent studies, corporate accountability remains under-researched and under-theorized, especially when compared to political accountability.