Transparency in Supply Chains (TISC): Assessing and Improving the Quality of Modern Slavery Statements

Abstract

Transparency lies at the heart of most modern slavery reporting legislation, but while publication of statements is mandatory, conformance with content guidance is voluntary, such that overall, corporate responses have been poor. Existing studies, concentrated in business to consumer rather than inter-organisational contexts, have not undertaken the fine-grained assessments of statements needed to identify which aspects of reporting performance are particularly poor and the underlying reasons that need to be addressed by policy makers. In a novel design, this study utilises the ethical trade initiative assessment framework to evaluate the content of 95 UK government suppliers’ modern slavery statements. The findings suggest that in a modern slavery context, discovery challenges are more important than firms’ attitudes to disclosure. We contribute to the transparency literature through a model contrasting discovery costs and disclosure risks and by identifying the disclosure of unknowns as an additional relevant dimension of disclosure. We then discuss the model in relation to normativity theory to consider options through which the currently low legitimacy of the reporting governance regime can be enhanced and the intended norms established.

The dark side of the cascading compliance model in global value chains

“…Value sharing can result in suppliers-including lower-tier ones-being transparent with MNEs and auditors and maintaining communication to share any issues they face in ensuring better working conditions. Transparency in sharing concerns will engender trust, enable the collaborative solution of any issues as they arise, and better prepare MNEs for any problems likely to affect them in the short term (Pinnington et al, 2022).…”

Business Versus Ethics? Thoughts on the Future of Business Ethics

“…This research provides insights into the tensions between the ability of such laws to work toward long-term change and their limitations due to regulatory capture by interest groups focused primarily on reducing business risk. In addition, this study, along with others such as Pinnington et al (2022), use normativity theory to provide insights into the perceived legitimacy of these disclosurebased regulatory regimes, which calls for additional research into how to enhance their legitimacy. Pinnington et al (2022) also open new possible avenues for improving disclosure regimes by examining corporations' disclosures on their discovery efforts, including corporations' discussion of the "known unknowns" in their supply chains and how they plan to fill that information gap.…”

“…In addition, this study, along with others such as Pinnington et al (2022), use normativity theory to provide insights into the perceived legitimacy of these disclosurebased regulatory regimes, which calls for additional research into how to enhance their legitimacy. Pinnington et al (2022) also open new possible avenues for improving disclosure regimes by examining corporations' disclosures on their discovery efforts, including corporations' discussion of the "known unknowns" in their supply chains and how they plan to fill that information gap. Business ethics scholars are also well-positioned to explore how government can improve the regime through "guidance, leadership, training and scrutiny" and not simply the use of coercive power (Pinnington et al, 2022).…”

“…Pinnington et al ( 2022 ) also open new possible avenues for improving disclosure regimes by examining corporations’ disclosures on their discovery efforts, including corporations’ discussion of the “known unknowns” in their supply chains and how they plan to fill that information gap. Business ethics scholars are also well-positioned to explore how government can improve the regime through “guidance, leadership, training and scrutiny” and not simply the use of coercive power (Pinnington et al, 2022 ). For example, public procurement practices, which focus on the government providing positive incentives, as opposed to using coercive power, are a potentially valuable tool in need of further research (Martin-Ortega, 2018 ).…”

Social visibility and substance in corporate social sustainability disclosures

“…, 2019; Monciardini et al. , 2019) and with statutory and voluntary norms (Pinnington et al. , in press), the use of metaphors in MSS (Ras and Gregoriou, 2019) and an in-depth analysis of the development of one company's MSS over time (New and Hsin, 2021).…”