Stakeholder accountability through the World Wide Web: Insights from Nonprofits

Accountability to stakeholders has always been pivotal in supporting nonprofit organizations in legitimizing their existence within local communities and building public trust. The development of Web-based accountability tools has offered growing possibilities to communicate and engage in dialogue with stakeholders. However, nonprofit organizations are not yet fully exploiting the potential of the Web. By focusing on Italian bank foundations, this study explores the use of the Web as a tool for discharging accounts to stakeholders and involving them in dialogue. The data show that most of the foundations do not use websites to communicate interactively with their stakeholders, and communication is limited to one-way disclosure of information. The results suggest more steps can be taken to ensure increased responsiveness to community needs.