We disaggregate board interlocks by the gender of the connecting director and examine their effect on firms’ environmental and social (ES) performance. Interlocks mediated by female directors are associated with a deterioration in ES scores, while male-mediated interlocks exhibit the opposite pattern. Using an instrumental variable approach that exploits variation in state-industry- year director supply, and event study estimates that exploit California’s 2018 board gender quota as an identifying shock, we show that the negative post-quota effect is most pronounced for health and safety score, the ES outcome most dependent on active board-level oversight. An examination of the mechanism reveals that post-quota female directors who create interlocks have strong financial credentials rather than stakeholder-oriented backgrounds, shifting the priorities transmitted through female-mediated interlock connections.
Presented at the 36th Australasian Finance and Banking Conference, the International Corporate Governance Society Conference (ICGS23), the Women and Finance Université Paris 1 Sorbonne, the Research Symposium in Finance and Economics 2023, the FMCG23 conference, the 16th Financial Risks International Forum, French Inter Business School Workshop in Finance
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4260457
(solo authored paper)
Older versions of this article have been previously circulated with the title “Overboarded”.
Annalisa Tonetto 