A multi-component approach to conceptualizing the reputation of the mining industry from a stakeholder perspective

Abstract There is a dichotomy in the perception of mining enterprises. On the one hand, mining is one of the world's most important economic sectors. On the other hand, the real or perceived impacts of mining operations raise concerns among stakeholders and contribute to the unfavourable reputation of mining industries. Our study has endeavoured to identify the factors important in the formation of the face of mining among stakeholders. On the basis of an on-line survey focused on four target stakeholder groups in Australia, we have examined a hypothesized multi-criterion assessment framework of the reputation of the industry among these stakeholder groups. Using a stratified random recruitment strategy and snowball sampling, we collected a sample of 330 participants. Our findings identified: (i) needs and expectations of stakeholders about aspects of mining activities that are perceived as the most problematic; (ii) the importance of the type of information sources followed by the stakeholders when shaping their opinion about mining; and (iii) the prevalence of environmental and visual concerns over economic concerns, which has been confirmed among various stakeholder groups. In this study, we highlight the complexity of the relationships between personal factors and attitudes that build the reputation, and we highlight that reputations cannot be managed separately for each group of stakeholders.