Empirical review of local government annual reports in Finland: Considerations of sustainability

Abstract

A growing literature has been exploring the different aspects of sustainability in local government financial reporting, and this article contributes to the literature by examining the reporting of the SDGs in local government annual reports. The empirical data of this study is based on Finnish local governments’ annual reports from the financial year 2022. The findings indicate that local governments have not yet widely included the SDGs in their annual reports. However, the different aspects of sustainability have already become an essential part of local governments’ annual reports. The findings are discussed in relation to the concepts of social infrastructure, institutional capacity, and three institutional isomorphic processes.