The aim of this paper is to identify and characterise the « sustainability development” (SD) reporting (or social and environmental reporting) in mobilising an analysis framework inspired by accounting and financial reporting. This leads to place the SD reporting between accountability, which is a more or less constraining duty and which obeys to imposed rules and communication which is let to the free production of the firm. From concrete situations (law or voluntary processes) the article examines the actual scope of duties, especially in the French case and deals with the stakes and the limits of standardisation for which only the GRI guidelines offer at the time being a comprehensive model.