Beyond Governance Attributes: How Fashion Companies Prepare Social Disclosure for the CSRD

ABSTRACT

This study examines how social disclosure readiness emerges under the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) and the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) and investigates whether and how, corporate governance supports such readiness within the European fashion companies. By adopting a qualitative case‐study approach, this research employs the ESRS architecture as an analytical lens, providing early empirical evidence on CSRD implementation. The findings show an overall moderate‐to‐high structural alignment with ESRS social standards, but readiness remains constrained by recurrent asymmetries, including weak materiality‐to‐disclosure linkages, selective disclosure of negative information, limited methodological traceability, low standardisation of social metrics and persistent gaps in the operationalisation of affected communities. Governance supports social disclosure quality through enabling, legitimising and selective levers that actively construct reporting boundaries, determining which social issues are measurable, comparable and suitable for assurance, and which remain outside formal disclosure practices.