Most cited papers in Corporate Social Responsibility Reporting
What are the most cited papers in Corporate Social Responsibility Reporting?
The most cited paper in Corporate Social Responsibility Reporting is "Managing Legitimacy: Strategic and Institutional Approaches" (Mark C. Suchman, 1995), with 12,673 citations. Next come "Toward a Theory of Stakeholder Identification and Salience: Defining the Principle of who and What Really Counts" (9,522) and "Corporate Social and Financial Performance: A Meta-Analysis" (7,659).
Showing 50 of 99 papers. Every paper with more than 1,643 citations is listed.
| # | Paper | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Managing Legitimacy: Strategic and Institutional Approaches Mark C. Suchman · Academy of Management Review | Jul 1995 | 12,673 |
| 2 | Toward a Theory of Stakeholder Identification and Salience: Defining the Principle of who and What Really Counts Ronald K. Mitchell, Bradley R. Agle, Donna J. Wood · Academy of Management Review | Oct 1997 | 9,522 |
| 3 | Corporate Social and Financial Performance: A Meta-Analysis Marc Orlitzky, Frank L. Schmidt, Sara L. Rynes · Organization Studies | Mar 2003 | 7,659 |
| 4 | THE CORPORATE SOCIAL PERFORMANCE-FINANCIAL PERFORMANCE LINK Sandra A. Waddock, Samuel B. Graves · Strategic Management Journal | Apr 1997 | 6,497 |
| 5 | A Stakeholder Framework for Analyzing and Evaluating Corporate Social Performance Max Clarkson · Academy of Management Review | 1995 | 6,115 |
| 6 | Corporate Social Responsibility: a Theory of the Firm Perspective Abagail McWilliams, Donald S. Siegel · Academy of Management Review | 2001 | 5,797 |
| 7 | Misery Loves Companies: Rethinking Social Initiatives by Business Joshua D. Margolis, James P. Walsh · Administrative Science Quarterly | Jun 2003 | 5,162 |
| 8 | Why would corporations behave in socially responsible ways? an institutional theory of corporate social responsibility John L. Campbell · Academy of Management Review | Jul 2007 | 4,890 |
| 9 | ESG and financial performance: aggregated evidence from more than 2000 empirical studies Gunnar Friede, Timo Busch, Alexander Bassen · Journal of Sustainable Finance & Investment | 2 Oct 2015 | 4,562 |
| 10 | Voluntary Nonfinancial Disclosure and the Cost of Equity Capital: The Initiation of Corporate Social Responsibility Reporting Dan S. Dhaliwal, Oliver Zhen Li, Albert Tsang et al. · The Accounting Review | 10 Sep 2010 | 4,143 |
| 11 | How corporate social responsibility is defined: an analysis of 37 definitions Alexander Dahlsrud · Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management | 9 Nov 2006 | 4,079 |
| 12 | Politically Connected Firms Mara Faccio · American Economic Review | Feb 2006 | 4,071 |
| 13 | Corporate Social Responsibility Theories: Mapping the Territory Elisabet Garriga, Domènec Melé · Journal of Business Ethics | Aug 2004 | 3,991 |
| 14 | The Impact of Corporate Sustainability on Organizational Processes and Performance Robert G. Eccles, Ioannis Ioannou, George Serafeim · Management Science | Nov 2014 | 3,979 |
| 15 | Corporate Social Performance Revisited Donna J. Wood · Academy of Management Review | Oct 1991 | 3,967 |
| 16 | The Business Case for Corporate Social Responsibility: A Review of Concepts, Research and Practice Archie B. Carroll, Kareem M. Shabana · International Journal of Management Reviews | 15 Jan 2010 | 3,915 |
| 17 | Corporate social responsibility and access to finance Beiting Cheng, Ioannis Ioannou, George Serafeim · Strategic Management Journal | 12 Apr 2013 | 3,867 |
| 18 | Introduction Craig Michael Deegan · Accounting Auditing & Accountability Journal | Aug 2002 | 3,784 |
| 19 | Shareholder value, stakeholder management, and social issues: what's the bottom line? Amy J. Hillman, Gerald D. Keim · Strategic Management Journal | 2001 | 3,702 |
| 20 | WHY COMPANIES GO GREEN: A MODEL OF ECOLOGICAL RESPONSIVENESS. Pratima Bansal, K. F. Roth · Academy of Management Journal | Aug 2000 | 3,675 |
| 21 | Corporate social responsibility and financial performance: correlation or misspecification? Abagail McWilliams, Donald S. Siegel · Strategic Management Journal | May 2000 | 3,619 |
| 22 | What We Know and Don’t Know About Corporate Social Responsibility Herman Aguinis, Ante Glavas · Journal of Management | Mar 2012 | 3,543 |
| 23 | A Resource-Based Perspective On Corporate Environmental Performance And Profitability Michael V. Russo, Paul A. Fouts · Academy of Management Journal | Jun 1997 | 3,509 |
| 24 | Does corporate social responsibility affect the cost of capital? Sadok El Ghoul, Omrane Guedhami, Chuck C.Y. Kwok et al. · Journal of Banking & Finance | 11 Feb 2011 | 3,440 |
| 25 | Putting the S back in corporate social responsibility: A multilevel theory of social change in organizations Ruth V. Aguilera, Deborah Elizabeth Rupp, Cynthia A. Williams et al. · Academy of Management Review | Jul 2007 | 3,426 |
| 26 | Revisiting the relation between environmental performance and environmental disclosure: An empirical analysis Peter M. Clarkson, Yue Li, Gordon D. Richardson et al. · Accounting Organizations and Society | 26 Jul 2007 | 3,337 |
| 27 | Corporate social and environmental reporting Rob Gray, Reza Kouhy, Simon Lavers · Accounting Auditing & Accountability Journal | May 1995 | 3,313 |
| 28 | Aggregate Confusion: The Divergence of ESG Ratings Florian Berg, Julian F Kölbel, Roberto Rigobón · European Finance Review | 23 May 2022 | 3,219 |
| 29 | Relationship between organizational justice and organizational citizenship behaviors: Do fairness perceptions influence employee citizenship? Robert H. Moorman · Journal of Applied Psychology | Dec 1991 | 3,191 |
| 30 | The relationship between corporate social responsibility and shareholder value: an empirical test of the risk management hypothesis Paul C. Godfrey, Craig B. Merrill, Jared M. Hansen · Strategic Management Journal | 30 Dec 2008 | 3,188 |
| 31 | Corporate Social Responsibility: Strategic Implications* Abagail McWilliams, Donald S. Siegel, Patrick M. Wright · Journal of Management Studies | 2006 | 3,168 |
| 32 | INSTRUMENTAL STAKEHOLDER THEORY: A SYNTHESIS OF ETHICS AND ECONOMICS Thomas M. Jones · Academy of Management Review | Apr 1995 | 3,155 |
| 33 | CORPORATE SOCIAL PERFORMANCE AND ORGANIZATIONAL ATTRACTIVENESS TO PROSPECTIVE EMPLOYEES. Daniel B. Turban, Daniel W. Greening · Academy of Management Journal | Jun 1997 | 3,009 |
| 34 | Evolving sustainably: a longitudinal study of corporate sustainable development Pratima Bansal · Strategic Management Journal | 22 Dec 2004 | 2,889 |
| 35 | The Relationship Between Corporate Philanthropy And Shareholder Wealth: A Risk Management Perspective Paul C. Godfrey · Academy of Management Review | Oct 2005 | 2,856 |
| 36 | Firms and social responsibility: A review of ESG and CSR research in corporate finance Stuart Gillan, Andrew Koch, Laura T. Starks · Journal of Corporate Finance | 30 Jan 2021 | 2,841 |
| 37 | Politically connected CEOs, corporate governance, and Post-IPO performance of China's newly partially privatized firms☆ Jintu Fan, Tsz Chung Wong, Teng Zhang · Journal of Financial Economics | 25 Jan 2007 | 2,795 |
| 38 | Job demands, perceptions of effort‐reward fairness and innovative work behaviour Onne Janssen · Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology | Sep 2000 | 2,791 |
| 39 | The Impact of Environmental Management on Firm Performance Robert D. Klassen, Curtis P. McLaughlin · Management Science | Aug 1996 | 2,766 |
| 40 | Stakeholder Theory: The State of the Art Bidhan Lalit Parmar, R. Edward Freeman, Jeffrey S. Harrison et al. · Academy of Management Annals | 2010 | 2,757 |
| 41 | Boards of Directors and Corporate Financial Performance: A Review and Integrative Model Shaker A. Zahra, John A. Pearce · Journal of Management | Jun 1989 | 2,691 |
| 42 | Maximizing Business Returns to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR): The Role of CSR Communication Shuili Du, CB Bhattacharya, Sankar Sen · International Journal of Management Reviews | 15 Jan 2010 | 2,607 |
| 43 | AN EMPIRICAL EXAMINATION OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY AND PROFITABILITY. Kenneth E. Aupperle, Andrew Carroll, John D. Hatfield · Academy of Management Journal | Jun 1985 | 2,543 |
| 44 | Corporate green bonds Caroline Flammer · Journal of Financial Economics | 31 Jan 2021 | 2,507 |
| 45 | The Impact of Corporate Social Responsibility on Firm Value: The Role of Customer Awareness Henri Servaes, Ane Miren Tamayo · Management Science | 9 Jan 2013 | 2,492 |
| 46 | Corporate Social Responsibility and Firm Financial Performance Jean B. McGuire, Alison Sundgren, Thomas Schneeweis · Academy of Management Journal | Dec 1988 | 2,455 |
| 47 | Corporate Social Responsibility as a Conflict Between Shareholders Amir Barnea, Amir Rubin · Journal of Business Ethics | 25 May 2010 | 2,333 |
| 48 | Determinants of corporate social responsibility disclosure: An application of stakeholder theory Robin W. Roberts · Accounting Organizations and Society | Aug 1992 | 2,331 |
| 49 | Value Maximisation, Stakeholder Theory, and the Corporate Objective Function Michael C. Jensen · European Financial Management | Sep 2001 | 2,308 |
| 50 | Individual and Corporate Social Responsibility Roland Bénabou, Jean Tirole · Economica | 16 Dec 2009 | 2,301 |
Citations are OpenAlex's own counts, from its 2026-09-23 snapshot, so the ranking can differ from Google Scholar or Web of Science. A paper is listed for a field when OpenAlex files it under one of the field's topics; retracted papers and papers whose citation count cannot be traced to citing works are left out, and a preprint and the article it became are shown once. Release dates are OpenAlex's: where a source gave only a month or a year, that is what is shown. How the lists are chosen.