Social Washing in Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Firms

AbstractThe growing importance of social sustainability fosters firms to communicate their social impact, e.g., through environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reporting. Unfortunately, firms’ actions are often not consistent with their communication. When action and communication on social sust...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of management in engineering 2025-01, Vol.41 (1)
Main Authors: Locatelli, Giorgio, Zagaria, Ilaria, Dei, Giacomo, Sainati, Tristano
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Construction companies
Construction engineering
Sustainability
Technical Papers
Washing
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Summary:AbstractThe growing importance of social sustainability fosters firms to communicate their social impact, e.g., through environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reporting. Unfortunately, firms’ actions are often not consistent with their communication. When action and communication on social sustainability are incongruent, social washing emerges. This paper aims to provide an exploratory analysis, based on multiple case studies, to investigate the dimensions and practices of social washing in architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) firms. The results reveal that the main social washing practices in AEC are misleading assessment of impacts, cherry-picking, inadequate or absent involvement of the local community, and concealment of modern slavery. We propose a framework for operationalizing the analysis of social washing practices in AEC firms. Finally, we provide an overview of the dimensions and practices of social washing, laying the groundwork for future studies on the topic.
ISSN:0742-597X
1943-5479
DOI:10.1061/JMENEA.MEENG-6095