Organizational espoused environmental commitment and its relation to environmental performance

This study explores the relationship between organizational environmental performance and organizational espoused environmental commitment. Organizational environmental performance is measured using the KDL SOCRATES corporate social index database. Espoused environmental commitment is new organizational construct. This study distinguishes it from other organizational constructs articulated in the business and natural environment literature. A scheme for measuring the construct through content analysis of corporate web sites is developed and utilized. Analysis indicates this measurement scheme provides a reliable and valid measure of espoused environmental commitment.; In examining the relationship between environmental performance and espoused environmental commitment, companies from two industries were considered, industrial machinery and chemicals. Analysis showed no support for a positive statistical relationship between environmental performance and espoused environmental commitment. These results indicate that some organizations may be missing opportunities to benefit in terms of enhanced public image through the communications of their environmental performance and internal initiatives. Conversely, other organizations may be using environmental communications either to distract stakeholders from inadequate environmental performance, or to make-up for past transgressions against the natural environment.