Beyond Tokenism: How Female Presence Redefines Governance and ESG Disclosure

Beyond Tokenism: How Female Presence Redefines Governance and ESG Disclosure

• Autor
• IGOR BERNARDI SONZA
• Co-autores
• Fábio Souza Medeiros Júnior
• Resumo

• Grounded in Critical Mass Theory and Agency Theory, this study investigates whether female representation on corporate boards and institutional investor monitoring influence corporate transparency. The objective is to assess the impact of women’s participation on ESG disclosure in Brazilian firms and examine the potential moderating role of institutional ownership. Using robust OLS regressions with panel data, the results show that the percentage of women on boards positively affects all ESG pillars, indicating that gender diversity enhances informational quality. The critical mass threshold of 30% is significant only for the Governance pillar, suggesting that deeper structural changes in compliance and transparency require surpassing tokenistic representation. Contrary to expectations, institutional ownership is negatively associated with Governance scores, and its moderating effect is not significant. Overall, the findings indicate that female presence on boards is a key driver of corporate sustainability in Brazil and operates independently of institutional investor pressure.

• Palavras-chave
• ESG, Female Presence, Board of Directors, Institutional Ownership, Corporate Governance.
• Modalidade
• Comunicação oral
• Área Temática
• Finanças Corporativas e Bancárias

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