E-government refers to the government’s use of ICTs to improve citizen access to and delivery of government activities and services (Bélanger and Carter, 2012). E-government also refers to the use of technology to boost public services and communication, as well as making government more effective and efficient (Krishnan et al., 2013). More it refers to a broad variety of government functions and activities that are affected by the ongoing integration of ICTs with certain other management paradigms (Ziemba et al., 2016). The usage of e-government aids the anti-corruption fight against self-serving tax dodging by state officials and others who plot large political corruption schemes (Singh et al., 2010). E-government can be considered from multiple perspectives such as e-society, e-administration, and e-citizens. Its successful implementation can lead to increased internal efficiency, stakeholder satisfaction, and service improvement because of standardized operational processes, the transformation of paper-based information into electronic form, and divergent databases (Nawaz et al., 2019; Hao et al., 2020b; Wu et al., 2020). Such types of activities help the stakeholders in easy access to government services. More in e-government platforms public services are not only supplied by the government but also incorporate citizens’ participation enabled by ICTs development (Anttiroiko et al., 2014).

Corporate social responsibility is described as a voluntary commitment by corporations to contribute to a better society and cleaner environment. Several governments have lost patience with a firm’s willingness to make adequate voluntary contributions to CSR activities; therefore, governments have taken steps to make mandatory CSR policy for promoting transparency and accountability. Gatto (2002) claims that mandatory CSR enhances corporate commitment and empowers numerous external stakeholders around firms. The use of mandatory CSR policy has been recommended as a way to persuade certain businesses to invest in CSR initiatives (Mukherjee et al., 2018). Scholars have argued that mandatory CSR is based on a country’s particular hard law rather than a soft law based on self-regulation (Scherer et al., 2016). Corporations are willing to turn the expectations of nation-states in terms of socioeconomic growth. The ramifications of mandatory CSR policy allow company executives to better understand and handle the concerns of local stakeholders and their intermediaries (Ioannou and Serafeim, 2012).

Corruption is characterized as the use of state authority or position for personal gain (Rose-Ackerman, 1999). Whereas Rodriguez et al. (2006) termed corruption as misuse of economic and social power for personal objectives. The corruption may be caused by a monopoly of power, lack of accountability, discretion, and transparency (Kaufmann, 2011). Hence, the companies that deliberately operate in illegal and corrupt circumstances endanger their reputations (Ioannou and Serafeim, 2012; Keig et al., 2015). Corruption at the organizational level is usually performed by the employees and managers on behalf of the corporation (Hao et al., 2020a; Nawaz et al., 2020a). Managers and employees are more likely to participate in unlawful conduct when the company’s transparency and morale are low. The literature on e-government (Nam, 2018; Linhartová, 2019; Adam, 2020) provides evidence on the importance of e-government in combating corruption and suggesting that government digitalization may help to fight against corruption.

Information and Communication Technologies are becoming increasingly popular due to the development of e-government. ICT as a technical solution can significantly enhance the effectiveness of individuals and organizations (Matmati, 2001). Indeed, ICT has an influence on working habits and practices as well as relationships within an organization. Moreover, ICTs can also be used as a measure of government digitization, more digital operations, procedures, services, transactions, and applications lead to a higher level of e-government (Uyar et al., 2021). The ICT infrastructure comprises basic ICT access, which includes personal computers, telephone lines, Internet penetration and access in remote regions as well as the speed at which the public may access the Internet. ICTs development is also found as a crucial component of a country that may serve as a foundation for e-government implementation. As ICTs development creates an effective mechanism for ICT access and structuring e-government (Nawaz et al., 2021).

The institutional quality of a country serves as an intermediary for efficient e-government development (Adam, 2020). ICTs in the context of e-government may be a cost-effective and easy way of ensuring open and transparent government which leads to reduced corruption in systems (Bertot et al., 2010). Countries that have achieved success in enacting transparency legislations have been linked to based efforts via e-government (Keig et al., 2015). ICTs promote good governance, boost reform-oriented efforts, improve connection among government personnel as well as monitor and manage government employee and project behavior. As a result of e-government advancement, institutions can become more transparent in their managing information and procedures. A strong country requires adequate financial market laws, a robust rule of law, intellectual property rights, and high-quality institutions capable of successfully combatting corruption as compared to weak institutions (Liu et al., 2021;Zheng et al., 2021).

Corporate social responsibility is a set of comprehensive policies related to corporate ethics, community service, and the environment that are integrated into a company’s operations (Carroll, 1970). By implementing CSR activities efficiently firms can gain multiple benefits such as long-term self-interest, greater stakeholder’s interest, and enhanced public image (Jain, 2020). Corruption at the organizational level is usually performed by the employees and managers on behalf of the corporation (Luo, 2005). Managers and employees are more prone to participate in unlawful conduct when the company’s transparency and morale are low. Corruption and corporate activities are endogenously influenced by economic conditions and the business environment because corruption has a negative influence on CSR performance. Organizations should develop infrastructure based on ethical corporate culture, a long-term business model, and a strong compliance framework. Therefore, it may be assumed that excellent CSR performance encourages businesses in combating risk-engaging in corrupt activities (Reyes-Menendez et al., 2018).

The different economies and global agencies are becoming more concerned about their CSR practices. In this scenario e-government is an endeavor to utilize and use telecommunications to enhance government effectiveness and efficiency, deliver better service to the community, provide more accessibility, and make government more responsible and transparent to society (Elbahnasawy, 2021). E-government plays a significant part in anti-corruption policies and helps organizations to enhance their CSR performance (Suhendi et al., 2020). Several prior research has illustrated e-government development has a beneficial influence on CSR performance (Azad and Faraj, 2014; Khan and Krishnan, 2019; Arayankalam et al., 2021). Based on the above-mentioned literature, we presented our hypothesis as follows:

E-government allows the government to provide services to citizens in a more convenient manner. An e-government framework must restrict the strategic policies and phases of e-government in terms of their execution and development. With CSR activities, firms can gain multiple benefits such as long-term self-interest, greater stakeholder’s interest, and enhanced public image (Krishnan and Teo, 2012; Lee et al., 2016; Roblek et al., 2020). Several governments have lost patience with a firm’s willingness to make adequate voluntary contributions to CSR activities. Therefore, governments have taken steps to make mandatory CSR policy for promoting transparency and accountability. Gatto (2002) claims that mandatory CSR enhances corporate commitment and empowers numerous external stakeholders around firms. The use of mandatory CSR policy has been recommended as a way to persuade certain businesses to invest in CSR initiatives (Mukherjee et al., 2018). Based on the above-mentioned literature, we proposed our hypothesis as follows:

Corruption is termed as misuse of public office for personal benefits. Corruption may be caused by selling the government property, bribery, kickbacks in government services, and misappropriation of state funds (Lu et al., 2021). E-government development in the country has a protentional effect on reducing corruption in organizations (Hardy and Williams, 2008). Similarly, Kim et al. (2009) argued corruption may be reduced through the development of e-government, transparency, and strong and efficient leadership. The firms that deliberately operate in illegal and corrupt situations cause critical damage to an organization’s reputation (Ioannou and Serafeim, 2012; Keig et al., 2015). The level of corruption differs considerably among countries as a manifestation of the country’s legal, cultural, economic, and political system (Kong et al., 2021). Based on the above-mentioned literature, we proposed our hypothesis as follows:

E-government is endeavored to create electronic services to improve the quality of services given to its stakeholders such as businesses, employees, residents, and other government entities. The ICTs development has resulted in the growth of e-participation, in which governments employ digital technologies to enhance stakeholders’ participation and e-government development. ICTs development is also found as a crucial component of a country that may serve as a foundation for e-government implementation. As ICTs development creates an effective mechanism for ICT access and structuring e-government (McKnight et al., 2002; Dilham et al., 2020). According to previous literature, a direct link exists between e-government and ICT development (Ojha and Palvia, 2012). Based on the above-mentioned literature, we presented our hypothesis as follows:

E-government is a system that uses ICT as a tool to make communications and transactions among people, business organizations, and government agencies (Androniceanu et al., 2020; Roblek et al., 2020). ICTs in the e-government context may be a cost-effective and easy way of ensuring open and transparent government, which leads to reduced corruption in systems (Bertot et al., 2010). Countries that have achieved success in enacting transparency legislations have been linked to based efforts via e-government (Maqsoom et al., 2021b). ICTs promote good governance, boost reform-oriented efforts, improve connection among government personnel as well as monitor and manage government employee and project behavior (Chunhui Huo et al., 2020). As a result of e-government advancement, institutions can become more transparent in their managing information and procedures (Chang and Chu, 2006; Hwang and Choi, 2017; Dahwan and Raju, 2021). Based on the above discussions, we proposed our hypothesis as follows:

A strand of literature on corporate social responsibility has documented many incentives for the company to participate in CSR initiatives. The organizations with high CSR score are believed to be morally responsible and have minimum risk of corruption (Nawaz et al., 2019; Maqsoom et al., 2021a). CSR activities provide incentives to an organization in several ways such as CSR initiatives entail the better engagement of a corporation with its major stakeholders and increase the firm’s reputation. Moreover, participating in CSR activities can help to reduce the risk of unfavorable regulatory, legislative, and budgetary actions (Androniceanu et al., 2020). The use of mandatory CSR policy has been recommended as a way to persuade certain businesses to invest in CSR initiatives (Krishnan and Teo, 2012). The implications of mandatory CSR policy enable business leaders to better understand more clearly local stakeholders’ issues and manage their intermediaries (Khan et al., 2019). This shows that mandatory CSR policy significantly influences CSR performance.

Corruption is referred to as the misuse of economic and social power for personal objectives. Companies engaging in corrupt activities due to their corrupt operations lead to a negative effect on performance (Richey et al., 2005). Corruption at the organizational level is usually performed by the employees and managers on behalf of the corporation (Chedrawi et al., 2020). Managers and employees are more likely to participate in unlawful conduct when the company’s transparency and morale are low. Strategic and management flaws, as well as weak corporate ethics and misbehaviors, lead to ethical and social degradation. Firms must build strategic infrastructure that monitors and rectifies any unlawful activity to successfully prevent such risks particularly corruption (Idowu and Towler, 2004). Organizations should develop infrastructure based on ethical corporate culture, a long-term business model, and a strong compliance framework. Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that excellent CSR performance encourages businesses in combating risk-engaging in corrupt activities (Awan et al., 2021). Based on the above discussion, we proposed the hypothesis as follows:

Numerous studies have described ICT development as it has a significant influence on CSR performance. ICT as a technical solution can significantly enhance the effectiveness of individuals and organizations (Tuan, 2018). Indeed, ICT has an influence on working habits and practices as well as relationships within an organization. The contribution of ICT to the company may also be viewed as the creation of specialized capability that allows the firm to gain a competitive edge over its competitors (Liang et al., 2010). The corporations that paid more attention to the development of CSR activities enjoy a good reputation among their stakeholders (Vahdati et al., 2015). Particularly, in this era of ICTs development, any information related to corporations like their opinions on CSR can influence stakeholders’ decisions (Chunhui Huo et al., 2020; Nawaz et al., 2020b). Based on the above-mentioned literature, we proposed our hypothesis as follows:

The institutional quality of a country serves as an intermediary for efficient e-government development. ICTs in the e-government context may be a cost-effective and easy way of ensuring open and transparent government which leads to reduced corruption in systems (Tang et al., 2020). Countries that have success in enacting transparency legislation have been connected to based efforts via e-government (Carvalho et al., 2010). A strong country requires adequate financial market laws, a robust rule of law, intellectual property rights, and a high-quality institution capable of successfully combatting corruption (Hur and Kim, 2017). The ICTs development has resulted in the growth of e-participation and institutional quality in which governments employ digital technologies to enhance stakeholders’ participants and e-government development (Frankental, 2001).

Mandatory CSR policy is usually policy implemented by the regulatory bodies and institutions on organizations to follow some set of obligations of CSR not for the sake of profit but imposed by law to follow (Moisescu, 2015). During the e-government initiatives, some developing countries recently imposed a mandatory CSR policy like India has mandated the mandatory CSR policy in the Indians Companies Act 2013 (Section-135) (Bhattacharyya and Rahman, 2019). The imposition of mandatory CSR policy in organizations does not only improve CSR performance but firm performance as well (Nawaz et al., 2021).

Moreover, today’s firms are not solely fulfilling the mandatory CSR requirements but also on other CSR practices to remove sustainability risk either social or economic (Hossan Chowdhury and Quaddus, 2021). Therefore, organizations are focusing on CSR practices to improve the overall CSR performance for the best interest of stakeholders and fulfilling the stakeholders’ expectations in CSR. Additionally, mandatory CSR improves the firm performance as well as has a strong positive impact on the externalities; moreover, areas with mandatory CSR policies helped to decrease the CO₂ emission level and the wastewater in China (Chen et al., 2018). Therefore, we propose that,

Corruption has been a terrible element in the development of countries. Government always tries to eliminate and minimize it but somehow it exists in every phase of government. But the e-government initiatives can minimize corruption in places like Nigeria (Adam, 2020). Corruption is significantly related to corporate social responsibility and cultural elements and corruption are key elements of corporate social responsibility (Agyei-Mensah and Buertey, 2019). Moreover, Agyei-Mensah and Buertey (2019) argued that corruption is a part of culture because it depends on how the people and society understand the rules and guidelines in a state or community. Moreover, the performance of corporate social responsibility is negatively linked with the risk of corruption therefore firm-level determinants are related to corruption risk (Lopatta et al., 2017). Another study by Chantziaras et al. (2020) investigated the association between religious norms and CSR reporting and found a weaker positive relationship between these factors, particularly where there is a higher corruption level. Based on previous studies, the author proposes that,

Information and communication technologies development plays a crucial role in terms of introducing an e-government initiative because it provides a suitable platform for them to launch e-government initiatives to irradicate corruption in the country (Adam, 2020). ICT development has an important relationship with sustainability as ICT development creates enormous benefits for e-business and sustainable development (Nicolae and Sabina, 2012). E-government advancements may result in more public access to ICTs, as well as improved skills and training for using e-government networks. This means that a country’s e-government initiative might lead to a far broader ICT development agenda than when ICT advancements are undertaken to support specific government initiatives (Adam, 2020). Moreover, ICT development influences CSR engagement (Hendricx, 2020). There is limited evidence of ICT, e-government, and CSR; thus, we propose the hypothesis as,

The mediating role of institutional quality between e-government and corruption was studied by Adam (2020). He found that institutional quality is important to eliminate corruption in the country as well as provides a potentially strong platform to launch e-government initiatives. Interestingly, organizational related factors are also important as organizational size also leaves a significant impact on CSR engagement (Hendricx, 2020). Moreover, Heckelman and Powell (2010) suggested that institutional quality deteriorates, corruption severely damages growth, therefore confirming the claim that political institutional quality influences the connection between corruption and growth. Corruption is detrimental to economic progress, and it is exacerbated in nations with poor political systems (Méon and Sekkat, 2005). Evidence has lately emerged suggesting the rule of law may help to mitigate the link between transparency and corruption (Dar et al., 2021). Therefore, the author proposes that,

In this study, the stakeholder’s theory of CSR is used to explain the influence of e-government development on CSR performance through the mediating role of ICTs, CSR policy, corruption, and institutional quality. Freeman and Medoff (1985) defined stakeholders as “any individual or group who has an effect on or is influenced by the achievements of organizational goals.” All the stakeholders external and internal such as employees, consumers, governments, creditors, media, etc. may influence the performance of an organization (Nawaz et al., 2021; Qin et al., 2021). Corporations that perform well in terms of CSR activities may also be able to establish a strong bonding with their stakeholders (Cho et al., 2019). Therefore, when a company discloses its CSR, it is indicating that the company is socially responsible by communicating its attitude, activities, and outcomes in response to claims of its stakeholders. This study proposes 13 hypotheses and provides theoretical background. A graphical representation is presented in Figure 1.

All the constructs in the model will measure through the previous studies’ measurements. The e-government will be measured through three indicators (online service index, telecommunication infrastructure index, and human capital index), the ICT development through ICT development index based on three indicators (access, skill, and use), the institutional quality will be measured through Country Policy and Institutional Assessment (CPIA) index by World Bank based on four indicators (economic management, policies for social equity/inclusion, public sector management, and institutions and structural policies). We developed this measurement scale of all these constructs based on the previous indicators and analyzed the reliability and validity analysis through CFA and EFA or PLS-algorithm in Smart-PLS. We proposed a five-point Likert scale that varies from strongly disagree (1) to strongly agree (5). The questionnaire is made on the previous indicators used in the study (Adam, 2020). For further constructs, the Mandatory CSR Policy construct will be measured through four indicators introduced by the author based on previous studies (Cheng and Kung, 2016; Ramdhony, 2018). Moreover, for corruption, four indicator scales will be modified from the study of Mahmoudi and Bagheri Majd (2021). In the end, the CSR performance will be measured from Liu et al. (2014) study based on 10 items.