Whistleblowing systems: A systematic literature review on the design specifications and the consideration of the risk for organizational insiders to blow the whistle

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Abstract

Whistleblowing systems as internal company instruments for prevention and detection of compliance violations are increasingly recommended both in academic and practical literature. In the European Union, the discussion is currently activated by the EU legislation for better protection of whistleblowers, which needs to be transferred in national law by the member states end of 2021. This literature review examines the literature for the design specifications developed for whistleblowing systems under consideration of the risk for organizational insiders to blow the whistle. The purpose is to review the design specifications developed in scientific studies, the data basis on which they are built whether and, if so, how the risk for organizational insiders to blow the whistle is taken into account. A comprehensive database of literature has been examined. The result is systematic categorization of the specifications for the design of whistleblowing systems. Moreover, we conclude, that there is a lack of data basis for clear specifications. The research shows that in the design of whistleblowing-systems there is a lack of discussion of the risks for whistleblowers to suffer social and professional disadvantages.

Keywords: Whistleblowing, Compliance, Whistleblowing System, Compliance Management System, Empirical Research

Authors’ individual contribution: Conceptualization – S.S. and S.B.; Methodology – S.B.; Investigation – S.S.; Writing – S.S.; Supervision – S.B.

Declaration of conflicting interests: The Authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.

JEL Classification: K20, M14, M21

Received: 29.10.2020
Accepted: 07.01.2021
Published online: 11.01.2021

How to cite this paper: Scherbarth, S., & Behringer, S. (2021). Whistleblowing systems: A systematic literature review on the design specifications and the consideration of the risk for organizational insiders to blow the whistle. Corporate Ownership & Control, 18(2), 60-73. https://doi.org/10.22495/cocv18i2art5