The Mirage of Sustainable Development: The Impact of ISO 14001 Certification on Corporate Greenwashing

Abstract

As a tool for voluntary environmental regulation, ISO 14001 certification encourages enterprises to adopt substantive environmental practices to promote sustainability. However, many certified companies have been exposed to greenwashing scandals. Based on the fraud triangle theory, this study explores the impact of ISO 14001 certification on corporate greenwashing. This study collects panel data of Chinese-listed companies from 2010 to 2022 using the CSMAR Database and text analysis and applies a Tobit regression model for empirical testing. The results show that ISO 14001 certification has a significant positive effect on greenwashing. In addition, managerial myopia positively moderates the relationship between ISO 14001 certification and greenwashing. Information transparency negatively moderates the relationship between ISO 14001 certification and greenwashing. This study is the first to apply the fraud triangle theory to explore the problems of ISO 14001 certification in the implementation process, providing feasible paths to improve the efficacy of certification.