The Impact of Sustainable Accounting Practices on Improving Reputation and Investor Confidence: The Moderating Role of Environmental Awareness in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq
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Abstract
This study's main emphasis was to deploy a structural modelling approach to examine how environmental awareness moderates the impact of sustainable management practices (Sustainable Accounting Practices) on improving reputation and investor confidence in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. This was achieved by structurally modelling responses from 274 industrial company managers, investors, and accounting professionals across different industrial categories using Smart PLS. Our study advances the accounting and environmental management discourses by demonstrating how SMPs' orientation towards improving environmental management helps boost organizations’ reputations and investors' confidence. As a result, this study positions SMPs as an institutional mechanism that companies use to promote trust, legitimacy, and credibility rather than as a standard disclosure activity. The integration of stakeholder, signaling, and legitimacy theories into a single empirical framework applicable to economies with weak sustainability enforcement practices advances the sustainability literature from a theoretical perspective. The notable contribution is the theoretical conceptualization of corporate reputation as an active mechanism. Mandating companies across industries to integrate SMPs, especially in environmentally sensitive sectors such as energy and manufacturing, is key to attracting investors and promoting acceptable business practices.
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