Going green: how does CEO power solve the puzzle of intellectual capital and environmental sustainability disclosure?

Purpose Grounded in multi-theoretical framework, this research aims to explore how corporate intellectual capital affects environmental sustainability disclosure, and whether CEO power moderates this nexus. Design/methodology/approach For analysis, we utilize panel data for non-financial listed firms on Palestine Stock Exchange (PEX). To suppress the potential risk of endogeneity, the study analysis is robust for multiple estimators. Interestingly, robustness tests emphasize that the relationships remain consistent across different model specifications. Findings The findings reveal that the three key elements of corporate intellectual capital, namely, human, structural and relational are positively linked with better environmental sustainability disclosure. Moreover, the results unveil that the positive impact of intellectual capital turns out to be less significant under the presence of the powerful CEO. Practical implications The results highlight the importance of governance mechanisms that curb CEO self-interests and encourage sustained investment in sustainability aligned with stakeholder interests. Originality/value The crushing majority of prior literature has focused exclusively on the direct effect of corporate intellectual capital on environmental sustainability disclosure. To the best of the authors' knowledge, our research contributes to the sustainability accounting literature by being the first to explore the nuanced role of CEO power on the aforementioned nexus, which remains unexplored in emerging market settings.