Table of Contents
Introduction 3
Problem Area 4
Hypothesis 4
Problem Statement 4
Theory of Science 5
Hermeneutics 5
Positivism 8
Methodological Approach 9
Approaches to Research: Deduction and Induction 9
Data 10
Critique of Data 10
Theory 12
Theoretical Approach 12
An Overview of Genre Theory 13
The development of genre theory 13
Three different approaches to genre: the Sydney, American and British ESP Schools 15
The British ESP Approach 18
Genre colonies 20
The Evolution of a Genre 24
A Definition of Genre 26
Crisis Communication 27
Analysis 29
Analysis of the 2002 Annual Reports from Novozymes and DONG Energy 29
Reporting genre features 30
Promotional genre features 33
Part conclusion 37
Analysis of the DONG Energy 2011 Annual Reports from Novozymes and DONG Energy 38
Letters from the CEOs 39
The social context of the 2011 annual report genre 41
Part Conclusion 43
Discussion 45
Conclusion 47
Bibliography 48
Appendix: CD with annual reports 51
Introduction
Annual reports have been around for a long time, longer than a century depending on your definition of annual report. However, recent decades have seen annual reports change and change again to meet the demands of both regulations and stakeholders[1]. They have come to include more information and, in the case of many larger companies, can now be accessed online – indeed the Internet itself is relatively new. This development has in turn greatly increased the accessibility of annual reports to stakeholders, now allowing anyone with any level of interest in the company an insight into how it conducts its business. The importance of a ‘green report’ has also emerged, requiring more attention on companies’ environmental considerations. Furthermore, how companies conduct themselves as a business, both morally and ethically, has also become an important factor in annual reports s a result of easier access and an increased attention on social responsibility. The growing importance of both of these factors for annual reports is considerable, resulting in a more promotional approach being adopted by companies: promoting their green values, their considerations for the future, what has gone right and what has gone wrong. The Letter from the CEO or Chairman is a prime example of how the purpose of annual reports is not strictly to report. Such a letter is now a major component of any annual report, the actual numbers, figures and statistics not being the focus in that particular section. It is precisely because of all these changes and because of the increasing demands of what an annual report must accomplish, that it becomes interesting to analyse it as a genre and how it has evolved. This project will use a case study of annual reports from Novozymes and DONG Energy as a means to do so. Both companies are interesting to analyse due to their size and the fact that they are based in Denmark. Being based in Denmark provides the opportunity to focus the analysis within a Danish context, and the size of the companies requires them to be very attentive to e.g. environmental concerns. Smaller companies to not receive the media exposure or attention from stakeholders that larger company do and larger companies cannot afford to ignore key concerns of their stakeholders, since it could quickly escalate into a crisis.
Problem Area
With the increased demands of what an annual report must accomplish for a company, the annual report as a genre has to accommodate these demands. Since an annual report is inherently a reporting genre, this creates a problematic situation in terms of meeting the demands of being more promotional. Since the annual report genre is not immediately equipped to handle this, changes must occur as a result. While the genre may only change slightly every year, the changes accumulate to form an evolution of the genre. Given that different companies structure their annual reports differently, this evolution might be chaotic, but also result in a more unified genre with a clear communicative purpose.
My own preconceptions give rise to the assumption that this evolution, when seen over a period of several years through a case study, can be identified and analysed in terms of what has changed and why, which is illustrated in the following hypothesis.
Hypothesis
· Annual reports exhibit a range of characteristics that define it as a genre, which will have evolved over a period of several years in a response to changing and increasing demands of what it must accomplish, resulting in a different or clearer communicative purpose for the genre.
In the attempt to either falsify or verify this hypothesis, annual reports from Novozymes and DONG Energy will be analysed with emphasis on an interpretive approach, each including a report from both 2002 and 2011.
To examine this hypothesis further, the following problem statement will be addressed.
Problem Statement
· To what extent can it be argued that the annual report genre has evolved over the course of nine years, as a result of specific changes in response to increased demands of what the genre has to accomplish for a company?
Theory of Science
This section will present the theory of science relevant for this project, with both hermeneutics and positivism being necessary to clarify. Hermeneutics is an approach that addresses the interpretation of meaning, whereas social constructivism addresses how concepts and meaning itself are socially constructed.
Hermeneutics
The hermeneutic approach adopted in this project will be based on Hans-Georg Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics. The key concepts for this approach are pre-understandings and prejudice, which form the basis for interpreting meaning, as explained by Nørgaard:
“That a manifestation of life[2] appears to us as an articulation of meaning, is only possible due to us encountering this manifestation with a pre-understanding, i.e. a meaningful expectation of meaning.”
(2003, 186 – his emphasis)[3]
Any given ‘manifestation of life’ can only be attributed meaning, in so far as a pre-understanding exists to give rise to ‘a meaningful expectation’ of what this meaning is. If there is no pre-understanding of a given manifestation, an interpretation thereof would simply not make sense, because there is no basis for such an interpretation to take place. As a consequence of this, prejudices are also inseparable from meaning, since pre-understandings in turn are based upon prejudice. However, it is critically important to be aware, that prejudices should not be seen as necessarily, nor inherently, negative or positive in this regard. Rather, prejudices are a resource, without which pre-understandings could not exist (Nørgaard 2003). It is important to be aware of these pre-understandings and prejudices within hermeneutics for the above reasons alone, but they are furthermore essential for interpreting meaning. This is best illustrated by the hermeneutic circle:
(Nørgaard 2003, 185)
Interpreting meaning through the use of existing pre-understandings and prejudices is done by viewing them as part of a whole, and it is the relationship between the part and the whole that is the essence of the hermeneutic circle. The circle illustrates how the whole only makes sense through its parts, but the parts also have to be viewed in the context of the whole. Specifically, the pre-understandings constitute the parts, and the parts give rise to a new understanding of the whole. The whole will eventually become part of a new pre-understanding through reforming it, thus completing the circle as the pre-understanding changes how the parts are understood. The ontological[4] and epistemological[5] axes included in the figure shows this dialectical relationship between the pre-understanding and the understanding and the part and the whole respectively. To elaborate further, ontology is “[…]the study of being in general, or of what applies neutrally to everything that is real” (Encyclopædia Britannica “Ontology (metaphysics)” 2011, para. 1). This specifically relates to hermeneutics and the above axis by illustrating, that what neutrally applies to the part and the whole, i.e. what they are, is expressed through the pre-understanding and the understanding. Epistemology is “[…] the study of the nature, origin, and limits of human knowledge” (Encyclopædia Britannica “Epistemology (philosophy)” 2011, para. 1). Epistemology thus expresses how the knowledge possessed by the understanding subject, e.g. myself, can be understood as the part and the whole. Note however, that Nørgaard’s illustration is not a model to be followed, nor is any illustration of the hermeneutic circle. It merely serves as an illustration of how the hermeneutic circle functions. In extension of this, it is important to clarify that while the concept of a hermeneutic ‘circle’ might suggest a beginning and an end to the process of interpreting meaning, i.e. one starts at a point of understanding, pre-understanding, the part or the whole, this would be erroneous. Gulddal and Møller elaborate:
“This process is not something to be avoided or brought to a finish in a definitive, ‘objective’ understanding; on the contrary it implies that the interpretation […] becomes an infinite task.”
(1999, 20)[6]
It is thus important to understand, that the dialectical movement between the part and the whole and between the pre-understanding and the understanding is an ongoing, dynamic process. The interpretation of an ‘objective’ truth to a given manifestation, then, is merely approached in an infinite approximation.
This project is extensively influenced by this hermeneutic approach, since it is based on a pre-understanding of genre evolution: that given a period of several years, the genre of annual reports would evolve due to changes in the demands of what it has to accomplish. This then lead to an analysis of the parts, i.e. the 2002 annual reports from Novozymes and DONG Energy, which then lead to a new understanding of what the communicative purposes of the genre was, as well as how the genre was both reporting and promotional. This then became the new whole, which gave rise to a new pre-understanding of what the 2011 annual reports would contain, e.g. to what extent the social contexts would change how the annual reports were written. This then lead once more looking at the parts, i.e. the 2011 etc. This example illustrates the hermeneutic approach of this project.
Positivism
Based on the thoughts of French philosopher Auguste Comte, positivism has two essential affirmations:
· “[…]that all knowledge regarding matters of fact is based on the “positive” data of experience[…]” and
· “[…]that beyond the realm of fact is that of pure logic and pure mathematics[…]”
(Encyclopædia Britannica “Positivism (philosophy)”, 2011, para. 5).
The emphasis of positivists is thus strictly on what can be observed and objective experiences, an approach that is especially prevalent within marketing communication. While annual reports are not typical marketing communication, the influence of promotional features requires the mention of positivism here. While it could be argued that the analysis strictly observes the content of the annual reports, i.e. lexico-grammatical features and textual organisation, there is also a great deal of interpretation in determining how and why certain features can be considered to represent an evolution of the genre; this is even more pertinent given the importance of the social contexts. This is simply not compatible with the objectivity sought by a positivist approach. This interpretation is necessary, because the annual reports are not strictly numbers and figures, but a promotion of the company as well.
Methodological Approach
Approaches to Research: Deduction and Induction
When doing any kind of research, there are two primary methods that can be used as an approach: induction and deduction. A deductive approach applies a broad theory to the particular data being researched. Through this process the theory is narrowed down to be more specific, thus allowing the theory to fit to a particular set of data. As a result, the research undergoes a process of moving from the generalised to the specific aspects of the data, using the theory to deduct a logical correlation between the two and arrive at a conclusion. This approach ensures a high validity of the knowledge and information gained, but conversely there is a lack of new knowledge gained as well. The inductive approach on the other hand, focuses on the experience of data, e.g. through observation, from which general descriptions can be put forth. These general descriptions will then lead to explanations and possible theoretical definitions, i.e. new knowledge and information is gained. However, the validity of this information cannot be viewed as completely reliable or definite, precisely because it is new data (Birkler 2005, 66-71).
The research in this project is based on a case study of annual reports from DONG Energy and Novozymes, one from 2002 and one from 2011 for each company, working from the hypothesis that annual reports will exhibit a range of characteristics that define it as genre and that this genre will have evolved over the course of the last nine years. Case studies can be difficult to analyse with an exclusively deductive or inductive approach, since the researcher will always influence the selection of data, the structure of the analysis and the choice of words chosen to describe the specific aspects analysed. Flyvbjerg (1988, 6-7) argues that as a result of this, it is impossible to conduct a case study with only an inductive or deductive approach. Furthermore, “[…]pure induction without prior theory might prevent the researcher from benefiting from existing theory, just as pure deduction might prevent the development of new and useful theory” (Carson et al. 2001, 99). This project can be considered to make use of a deductive approach in order to establish a theoretical framework for analysing genre, i.e. narrowing down the broad concept of genre theory to a workable theory applicable to annual reports. However, an inductive approach is used to interpret the findings and understand how the specific genre of annual reports has possibly evolved. A hermeneutical approach is also taken here, as the analysis will first focus on describing the annual report as a genre in 2002, based on the assumption that both reports will share similar traits of the genre. This will then form new knowledge which serves as a starting point for analysing the 2011 reports and how the genre has evolved.
Data
This project’s data consists of two annual reports for both DONG Energy and Novozymes, one being from 2002 and the other 2011. The two companies have been chosen in order to represent two large companies that both operate in Denmark and are based in Denmark, but sell entirely different products. This first and foremost separates the content found within the annual reports, one being a bank and the other a biotechnical company, allowing the analysis to focus on similar traits of the annual report genre, without a possible muddling of data within a sub-genre of e.g. banking or the financial sector. Changes more specific to those sub-genres can still be brought up, if relevant, in relation to the differences between the 2002 and 2011 reports. Reports were chosen from those two years for two reasons. First of all, the year 2002 is near as far back as annual reports are stored online by many companies; some companies go further back some start later. While it is certainly possible to go further back and find physically archived reports, going too far back will mean an almost certain extent of large changes simply due to the difference in time. This is no less an evolution of a genre, but it becomes harder to notice smaller, gradual changes that reveal how a genre has evolved over time, as opposed to, when viewed through a lens of e.g. several decades, a massive leap in evolution all at once. Secondly, from 2002 to 2011 the Internet, now a major facilitator of information affecting and shaping the world we live in, has changed a lot: there was no Facebook in 2002 for example. This allows a period of nine years to still be significant for analysis, as opposed to reports 20 years or 25 years apart, due to the change in the social contexts genres exist within during that period.