Are Women the Panacea? Exploring the Direction of Socially Responsible Commitment

In pursuing the transition toward renewable energy adoption, firms play a crucial role and should implement environmentally oriented practices against climate change related risks. The academic debate has long tried to explore the factors that drive non-financial commitment and corporate governance features emerge as relevant to this aim. In detail, the role of gender diversity has been explored as a possible lever of environmentally oriented corporate choices. By empirically analyzing a sample of highly capitalized European firms, constituents of the Bloomberg 500 Index, this chapter aims at deepening the analysis of the benefits in terms of renewable energy use, connected to including women in management structures. In particular, the analysis focuses on the partial brake represented by a positive perception concerning each firm own exposure toward climate change. In this sense, this chapter contributes to literature by underlining the need for a substantial commitment required in terms of environmental engagement, which must not be limited to apparent practices and mere compliance.