Communicating the corporate social responsibility (CSR) of international contractors : Content analysis of CSR reporting

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is gaining importance for international construction contractors and corporate reports are an effective tool in communicating their CSR efforts. However, CSR communication is a rare topic of discussion within the construction research field. This study establishes a systematic content analysis approach to compare CSR communication among contractors in different regions. It selected a sample of 310 international contractors from the Engineering News-Record list from 2009 to 2014 and collected data from their CSR-related reports. Significant disparities were found in CSR communication among the contractors in the four regions. European contractors showed the highest levels of CSR communication in both dimension- and issue-levels, while Chinese contractors ranked the lowest in CSR communication. Another interesting finding is that all four regions gave the highest priority to one CSR dimension, i.e. community involvement and development. This study serves as a starting point for research on CSR communication by construction contractors, including comparisons with companies in other industries. In addition, this study provides a useful tool for companies or scientific researchers to assess the status of CSR communication.