The concept of sustainable development (SD) was introduced in the “Our Common Future” report, launched in 1987, which influenced the emergence of many studies related to the role played by organizations as actors supporting SD. SD is a consolidated concept; however, since 1987, many political, social, and natural events have occurred on our planet, which have impacted companies’ behaviors. However, the diversity of research from different fields has provoked, among the academic community, a lack of clarity surrounding “sustainability” (S), “corporate sustainability” (CS) and “corporate social responsibility” (CSR) concepts. This lack of clarity can also be identified in companies, which have referred to “sustainability” only in the environmental field. Recently, increased discussions related to corporate sustainability metrics have shed light on the ESG criteria (environmental, social, and governance), increasing misperceptions associated with the concept. Ambiguous definitions and constructs may prevent managers from identifying sustainability goals for their companies. Therefore, literature reviews as a research method are more relevant than ever. Thus, in this work, we aim to answer the following question: How should we integrate different perspectives on corporate sustainability, in order to broaden the understanding of the concept? In this study, we conducted a focused bibliographic review and revisited the papers that most influenced the construction of the concepts. The information in this paper is helpful to improve the understanding of CS; to provide specific insights into the studies that have investigated this field; to help managers and entrepreneurs who are improving CS actions in their companies; and to support academia by putting together a large amount of information about this theme in one paper.

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Given the extreme importance of improving the accountability of private social solidarity institutions (IPSS), both for reasons of legal compliance and for reasons of improving legitimacy and notoriety among their stakeholders, in order to be accountable to them and in order to maintain their sustainability, this article aims to present a framework designed under a more comprehensive research project for the assessment of IPSS accountability, as well as the preliminary results of a pilot test of Portuguese IPSS. The framework was developed from a combination of methodologies that included a literature review, field work and a focus group, resulting in six dimensions with 76 indicators. For the pilot test, the data were collected by questionnaire for the years 2018, 2019 and 2020. The results of the pilot test, despite the limited number of entities, allowed the identification of some trends and indicators where entities show lower results and where they will have to focus to improve their accountability. Some possible effects of the COVID-19 pandemic were also identified. Therefore, we believe that the framework designed answers the research question: how can we promote accountability (social, financial and economic) in the social economy sector, in particular in the case of IPSS?

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The development of the non-profit sector (NPS) in Portugal has been gaining relevance in recent times, particularly in the form of institutions whose purpose is to broaden and increase the response to the needs of the most needy and socially vulnerable citizens. The financing of Portuguese non-profit sector entities is essentially made up of income from their activity, donations and public or governmental support. Therefore, these entities face increasing pressure from their funders, users and citizens in general for a greater dissemination of good practices regarding the social impact they have on the community; in particular, they are increasingly required to be transparent in their activities. The main objective of this study was to analyse the level of accountability and transparency of the private social solidarity institutions (IPSS) of the municipality of Porto. To this end, the websites of these institutions were analysed, using a qualitative and quantitative methodology, using the application of the transparency index Enhancement of an Accountability Guide for Learning E-Government, proposed by Santos, Ferreira, Marques and Azevedo (2018). This analysis allowed us to verify that there are still a considerable number of entities that do not have an institutional website, and those that do, have a low level of transparency.