Company disclosures concerning the resilience of cities from the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) perspective

Although companies are decisive in contributing to urban resilience, unresolved questions remain about what practices they can implement. Considering that the concept of resilience is acknowledged both explicitly and implicitly in a range of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), this research aims to fill the existing gap between theoretical considerations about the role of companies in fostering urban resilience and the practices they implement and disclose. On the one hand, we build a theoretical framework based on strategic and instrumental components that can support the contribution of companies to urban resilience. On the other hand, we analyze 138 sustainability reports of organizations operating in Italy and Japan to identify how the SDGs, with particular reference to those targets concerning environmental and social resilience, are implemented in their activities and communicated in their nonfinancial reports. Since greater attention to disclosures on the impacts of companies on resilience is a starting point for action towards achieving the SDGs, this study provides new insights into the contribution of companies to the resilience of cities, advancing the literature on the link between business and urban resilience.