Corporate gender diversity and carbon reduction: the moderating effect of national culture

Abstract

Climate change issues have led to growing attention in academia to corporate carbon-related practices. However, the role of female leadership in promoting carbon reduction and how diverse cultural contexts affect this role remain unknown. Therefore, this study investigated the role of corporate gender diversity (i.e. board gender and executive members’ gender diversity) in companies’ carbon emissions and intensities, and how national culture affects this role. Our results show that corporate gender diversity is negatively correlated with companies’ carbon emissions and intensities, individualism has a negative moderating effect, and masculinity has a positive effect. These findings emphasize the importance of corporate gender diversity in promoting board decision-making and related actions for carbon reduction, and clarify how national culture can affect the influence of corporate gender diversity on carbon reduction. Finally, based on our results, suggestions for practitioners on how to promote corporate carbon reduction are presented.