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Investing Up: FDI and the Cross-country Diffusion of ISO 14001 Management Systems
Abstract
Competition to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) creates opportunities for multinational enterprises (MNEs) to diffuse corporate management practices from their countries-of-origin (home countries) to countries hosting their foreign operations. We examine conditions under which MNEs transfer corporate environmental practices from home countries to host countries. Our focus is on ISO 14001, the most widely adopted voluntary environmental program in the world. We examine inward FDI stocks and ISO 14001 adoption levels for a panel of 98 countries, and a subset of 74 developing countries, for the period 1996–2002. We find support for the country-of-origin argument in that inward FDI stocks are associated with higher levels of ISO 14001 adoption in host countries only when FDI originates from home countries that themselves have high levels of ISO 14001 adoption. Countries’ ISO adoption levels are associated not with how much FDI host countries receive overall but from whom they receive it. Three implications emerge from this study: (1) FDI can become an instrument to perpetuate divergence in corporate practices across the world; (2) economic integration via FDI can create incentives for firms to ratchet up their environmental practices beyond the legal requirements of their host countries; (3) instead of racing down to match the less stringent corporate practices prevalent in developing countries, developed countries can employ FDI outflows to ratchet up corporate practices abroad given that developing countries are net recipients of developed countries’ FDI outflows.
... We apply insights from economic theory on quality uncertainty and adapt it to the context of solar PV auctions [46,47,50,[67][68][69]. As mentioned in section 3.1, compliance with international quality standards has been shown to overcome the buyer's insufficient information or lack of trust, for example in international trade [47,67,69] and foreign direct investment [48,68]. ...
... We apply insights from economic theory on quality uncertainty and adapt it to the context of solar PV auctions [46,47,50,[67][68][69]. As mentioned in section 3.1, compliance with international quality standards has been shown to overcome the buyer's insufficient information or lack of trust, for example in international trade [47,67,69] and foreign direct investment [48,68]. International quality standards create trust, as they signal use of state-of-the-art production processes. ...
... International quality standards create trust, as they signal use of state-of-the-art production processes. Signaling applies in principle to both domestic and international investors, but information asymmetry and lack of trust are especially relevant for foreign investors [46,47,68,69]. In the following, we outline how international quality standards introduced as technical requirements in public auctions could help remedy the lack of information and trust in solar PV performance. ...
Solar technology diffuses across the globe as countries transition from fossil to renewable energy. Little solar-specific experience and capacity in newly adopting countries can result in technical failures and lower solar plant performance. This contributes to making the investment in solar plants in newcomer countries risky and may undermine political targets of solar energy deployment. One solution suggested by international organizations is for policymakers in adopting countries to include international quality standards as technical requirements in public auctions. Here, we develop a conceptual framework on how international quality standards could help build a solar sector. As a case study, we analyze the explanatory factors of technical requirements in 100 public auctions of utility-scale solar photovoltaic plants carried out in India between 2013 and 2019. Our findings suggest that more international quality standards are required in auctions in which the government rather than a private actor ultimately carries the commercial risk. On the other hand, local content requirements and attracting foreign investors do not correlate with technical requirements. We argue that using minimal quality standards is unlikely to promote local technological catch-up or attract long-term foreign investments but transfers the techno-commercial risk from the government to the private sector.
... The first viewpoint is that technology spillovers in foreign trade have reduced pollution emissions. Grubb et al., (2002) [17] and Prakash et al., (2007) [18] demonstrated that import and export market prices and the quality of foreign commodities put competitive pressure on domestic companies of importing countries. The competitive effect led companies to upgrade their environmental protection technology to reduce the intensity of pollutant emissions. ...
... The first viewpoint is that technology spillovers in foreign trade have reduced pollution emissions. Grubb et al., (2002) [17] and Prakash et al., (2007) [18] demonstrated that import and export market prices and the quality of foreign commodities put competitive pressure on domestic companies of importing countries. The competitive effect led companies to upgrade their environmental protection technology to reduce the intensity of pollutant emissions. ...
... Table 6 presents the estimation results when technology innovation, as measured by the number of patents granted in each province, is considered as the mediating variable. Models (17) and (18) show that import trade technology spillovers help stimulate technological innovations in each province. Except for lnTECH in Model (22), the two technology spillover variables significantly affect the emission intensities of the two industrial air pollutants after controlling for the number of patents granted in each province. ...
China is in a strategic phase of an industrial green transformation. Industrial air pollution is a key environmental target for governance. Because import trade is a core channel through which advanced environmental protection technology is absorbed, the question of whether technology spillovers brought about by import trade can reduce industrial air pollution emissions is a topic worth exploring. This paper uses a generalized spatial two-stage least-square (GS2SLS) model to explore the impact of import trade technology spillovers on industrial air pollution emission intensities using panel data from 30 provinces and cities between 2000 and 2017. Economic scale, industrial structure, and technological innovation are used as intermediary variables to test whether they play mediating effects. The results show that: (1) capital and intermediate goods technology spillovers directly reduce industrial air pollution emission intensity and (2) import trade technology spillovers indirectly reduce emission intensities by expanding economic scale, optimizing industrial structure, and enhancing technological innovation through mediating variables. Furthermore, industrial structure optimization and technological innovation have the largest mediating effects on industrial SO2, while economic expansion has the most significant mediating effect on industrial smoke and dust. The mediating effects of technology spillovers from intermediate goods exceed those of capital technology spillovers. Finally, industrial air pollution emission intensity demonstrates both spatial agglomeration and time lag effects. Environmental regulations and energy structure are shown to increase industrial air pollution emissions, while urbanization and foreign direct investment reduce industrial air pollution. Based upon these research results, some pertinent policy implications are proposed for China.
... Finally, our research builds on growing research about CSR. Others have shown that international trade and investment ties among firms may contribute to the diffusion of environmental or labor standards as firms engaged in global business begin "trading up" or "investing up" (28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33). In the case of divestment from Burma by multinational firms, both home state political characteristics and interfirm networks shaped diffusion patterns (34). ...
States have long used economic sanctions in response to violations of international law as a strategy to restore order. Increasingly, firms also reject doing business with violators. In response to the war in Ukraine, hundreds of multinational corporations voluntarily withdrew from Russia, even when policymakers were still debating the extent of sanctions. How did firm managers evaluate whether to withdraw from the Russian market? Using a survey experiment with Japanese firm managers conducted three months after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, we explore how peer effects—information on what other firms are doing in response to the crisis—influence support for withdrawal of business activity with Russia. Our findings show that information about withdrawal by other firms from a diverse set of countries promotes peer conformity that increases support. In contrast, information about ongoing business with Russia by Chinese firms fosters competition that reduces support. Market exposure moderates these reactions, although the concern about peer behavior does not appear to be driven by a reputation mechanism. Our research provides insight into how business actors perceive the strategic interplay of peer influence and market dynamics in the context of geopolitical conflicts.
... The participation of MNCs, effectively constrained by the home country's government, reduces local enterprise profits, thereby compressing the space for corruption [45]. Additionally, MNCs can introduce advanced business management and industry regulation information, helping local governments improve institutional environments [46,47]. This "demonstration effect" positively impacts the host country's institutions. ...
The relationship between natural resource development and sustainable development has long been a focus in academia. In the context of a new global economic cooperation system, many scholars argue that such cooperation can lead to a “resource curse” effect in partner countries, hindering their sustainable development. This study analyzed panel data from 64 countries from 2008 to 2020, using the Belt and Road Initiative as a representative of multilateral economic cooperation (MEC) policies. The aim was to examine the actual impact of multilateral economic cooperation on the sustainable development levels of partner countries and to explore the underlying mechanisms influencing these outcomes. First, we measured and identified the sustainable development index (SDI) under natural resource development schemes and the “resource curse” effect in these countries. Then, we employed a double machine learning approach to evaluate the policy effects of MEC on sustainable resource development. We constructed an interactive double machine learning model to examine and validate the specific mechanisms of resource development effects. The results indicate that the level of sustainable resource development in MEC countries is relatively low, and a “resource curse” effect already exists. However, participating in MEC suppresses this “curse” effect. By promoting innovation cooperation, institutional improvement, structural optimization, trade openness, and pollution reduction, MEC effectively enhances the sustainable development levels of partner countries.
... Aseem [5] published five articles related to the topic, accumulating a cumulative 509 citations. His collaboration with Potoski is particularly notable; together they have explored issues such as cooperation and conflict in environmental governance, Voluntary Environmental Programs [42,43], and environmental governance based on the ISO 14001 [44] framework [45]. Ntim [46,47] has the highest average citation rate among all authors and has long been dedicated to studying corporate governance, environmental performance, and sustainability. ...
Against the backdrop of the global energy crisis and climate change, corporate environmental compliance has emerged as a key aspect of environmental regulation and a focal point of academic interest. It plays a crucial role in alleviating regulatory pressure, enabling green innovations, enhancing performance, and fostering sustainable development. Despite extensive research in the field, comprehensive reviews and bibliometric analyses remain scarce. To address this gap, this study meticulously analyzed 851 papers indexed in the WoS’s SSCI and SCI from 2004 to 2024. Using visualization tools like VOSviewer and CiteSpace, it conducted a multidimensional bibliometric analysis and systematic review, identifying core authors such as Aseem, Ntim, and Zeng, high-productivity countries including China, the USA, and the UK, and key journals like the Journal of Cleaner Production and Sustainability. Keyword co-occurrence and cluster analysis revealed central research themes of environmental information disclosure, innovation, and environmental management systems. Burst analysis highlighted emerging hot topics, notably ecological and green innovation, and the interplay between Total Factor Productivity and environmental regulations. Additionally, we identified several critical gaps in the field. For instance, research on corporate environmental governance mechanisms in the context of digital transformation remains insufficient. Furthermore, the effectiveness of multi-stakeholder collaborative governance frameworks requires ongoing investigation. Therefore, we encourage future researchers to focus on the following topics: digitization and environmental compliance, multi-stakeholder participation mechanisms, cost–benefit analysis of corporate environmental compliance, and the impact of political and regulatory environments on corporate environmental compliance.
... While the IR literature on GGIs has increasingly discussed the proliferation of GGIs, particularly less formal (e.g. Abbott et al., 2016;Abbott & Faude, 2021;Andonova et al., 2017;Rowan, 2021;Vabulas & Snidal, 2020) and narrower standards setting organizations geared towards particular policy problems (e.g., Büthe & Mattli, 2011;Dingwerth, 2008;Prakash & Potoski, 2007), less attention has been paid to the roles that advocacy groups might play in improving or at least testing the quality of the resulting GGIs. ...
The proliferation of the number, types, and activities of advocacy groups within and across countries creates new need for theories to account for their effects on global governance. In particular, we have limited knowledge on how, why, and under what conditions advocacy groups shape the procedures, performance, and distribution of global governance institutions (GGIs). By combining insights from International Nongovernmental Organization (INGO) theories in international relations with interest group theories in comparative politics, we gain new traction on these questions. This chapter reviews the findings of this edited volume on how political opportunities structures at the national and international level shape advocacy groups’ strategies and populations and thus their influence on GGIs operations and policy. It also examines the larger implications of these theoretical and empirical findings for future theory building on advocacy group effects in global governance and the quality of GGIs as well as the interplay of advocacy groups across scales of action.
... These sustainability certifications serve as viable instruments to help mitigate the negative impact of certified companies, but also to favor a positive impact (Prakash and Potoski, 2007;Martínez et al., 2019). Certifications have been the object of study on many occasions (Font and Buckley, 2001;Font et al., 2007;Esparon et al., 2014;Bianco et al., 2023) both from the perspective of the consumer and the company (Aguilar and Vlosky, 2007;Rowe and Higham, 2007;Esparon, 2013;Esparon et al., 2014). ...
There is a worldwide consensus that sustainability is the main basis for the recovery of tourism. In this context, tools and standards play an important role to facilitate the integration of the principles of sustainable tourism in practice. Within the tourism sector, the hotel industry is one of the key industries with a high growth rate. The main objective is to carry out an analysis based on the concept of sustainability in the sustainability certifications of the hotel industry, delving into those certifications adopted by the large hotel companies. For this purpose, a comparative analysis of the certification criteria is carried out using as a basis the World Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC). This article evidences the primacy of the environmental dimension and establishes recommendations that guide holistic and integrated sustainability strategies from a comprehensive perspective that allow the recovery of tourism in general and the sustainable hotel industry in particular.
... In recent years, most of the developing countries have experienced lower rate of growth in terms of reduction of poverty and pollution if the amount of foreign aid had been reduced (Addison et al. 2004). According to the 'trading up' (Vogel 1995 andGreenhill et al., 2009) and 'investing up' (Prakash and Potoski, 2007) criterion, high levels of globalization flows raises the environment quality as the preferences of the investors are pro-environmental. Shortage of domestic capital for environmental clean-up and conservation is one of the major factors responsible for environmental degradation in many developing countries. ...
121 The present study empirically investigates the impact of foreign aid on environmental quality in India with the presence of some linkage factors i.e. gross domestic product, trade liberalization, net forest depletion and total value added by the industrial sector. This study is based on the annual time series data covering the period from 1970-71 to 2010-11. By using the OLS technique, the study finds that impact of foreign aid on environment degradation is negative and statistically significant. However, aid helps in reduction of environment pollution in India. It concludes that deforestation, industrialization and economic growth are the major factors which responsible for environment degradation in India. This study suggests that, it is the responsibility of the government to make appropriate plans and programs to maintain a balance between growth challenges and environment challenges. Careful planning and systematic policies should be implemented to ensure that the green growth strategies do not result in a slow growth strategy.
... The globalized economy exerts significant influence on a wide set of domestic policies, including financial policies (Mosley 2003), welfare policies (Rudra 2002), environmental practice (Prakash and Potoski 2007), and human rights (Blanton and Blanton 2006;Kim and Trumbore 2010). Studies have also shown that the flow of global capital shapes labor standards through various pathways such as IMF and World Bank programs (Blanton, Blanton, and Peksen 2015b), financial crises (Blanton, Blanton, and Peksen 2015a), and trading relationships (Greenhill, Mosley, and Prakash 2009;Malesky and Mosley 2018). ...
How does the influx of foreign direct investment (FDI) affect labor protests in China? Building on the framework of fragmented authoritarianism, I argue that the regional competition to attract foreign investment causes labor protests in China due to its deregulatory effects on labor regulation. Each actor, including the central and local governments, foreign investors, and workers, has different cost–benefit considerations, which provide an explanation for the link between foreign investment and labor protests. By theorizing each actor's preferences, this article explains how FDI induces labor deregulation and workers’ protests in China. Analyzing China's prefecture-level city data from 2012 to 2018, I find that the influx of FDI is positively associated with labor protests. The result remains robust to alternative model specifications and instrumental variable estimation. I also provide empirical evidence for the deregulatory effect of FDI on labor standards with an analysis at the firm level using the World Bank Enterprise Survey. These findings deepen our understanding of how FDI shapes labor regulation and induces workers’ protests in the context of China.
... Economic exchanges have the potential to generate institutional spillovers between countries (Bahar et al., 2014;Bergstrand and Egger, 2013;Cheong et al., 2015;Li and Reuveny, 2003;Prakash and Potoski, 2007). The existence of these spillovers is another channel through which FDI can influence institutions. ...
... Foreign investors can result in faster adoption of international standards such as ISO. However, the adoption rate does not depend on the amount of foreign investment but on the investor (Prakash and Potoski 2007). The Czech Republic receives investments mainly from Western European countries, where the ERM approach may be more widespread. ...
This paper responds to the lack of empirical evidence on how enterprise risk management (ERM) and the financial performance of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are related. Structural equation modeling is used to explore new mediators in the relationship between ERM and SME financial performance. The results show that organizational culture (mission dimension) and strategic risk management performance are full and positive mediators between ERM and financial performance. These research results highlight the fact that the implementation of ERM in an enterprise does not by itself generate the expected effects without the existence of a mature organizational culture and the monitoring of strategic risk management performance. These findings are particularly relevant for SMEs with “pretend ERM” that lacks the strategic and operational components. ERM also helps to transform the negative effect of foreign capital in SME equity on financial performance into a positive effect.
... The inflow of foreign capital into firms means not only a strengthening of capital, but also control by foreign investors and the adoption of new management practices. The degree of adoption of international standards in individual countries is not related to how much total FDI host countries receive, but from whom they receive it (Prakash and Potoski 2007). Risk management in the Czech Republic is limited to companies that are required by their parent company abroad to follow formalized procedures, an outcome similar to that in neighboring Slovakia (Klučka and Grünbichler 2020). ...
The COVID-19 pandemic has had a devastating impact on many small and medium-sized businesses around the world. Enterprise risk management (ERM) is a conceptual framework that encompasses the systematic and comprehensive identification, analysis, and management of risks in an enterprise. In the post-communist countries of Central Europe, the level of ERM is still relatively low, especially in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). This study fills a gap in the existing knowledge on ERM by shedding light on the influence of foreign capital on the level of ERM implementation in Czech SMEs. The aim of the study is to assess the influence of the share of foreign capital in Czech SMEs on the level of ERM implementation. A validated self-report of 296 non-financial SMEs in the Czech Republic was analyzed using latent class analysis (LCA) and multiple linear regression. The results of the study contribute to the literature by enriching the empirical analysis of ERM in emerging markets. The originality of the results lies in the identification of three distinct groups of firms according to the combination of implemented ERM elements—“no ERM”, “best practice ERM”, and “pretended ERM”—and the finding that the share of foreign capital, age, and firm size influence the level of ERM implementation. In particular, the positive influence of foreign capital in younger companies makes it possible to overcome the barrier of traditionalist thinking of old-school Czech managers influenced by the period of economic transition in post-communist countries. The paper builds on the existing evidence with new empirical conclusions and argues for a greater inflow of foreign direct investment into emerging markets.
... Broadly, studies show that regulatory arbitrage can be reduced through formal governmental regulations or voluntary, self-regulatory action by firms. Potoski and Prakash argued across a series of papers (see for example, Potoski & Prakash, 2013, Potoski & Prakash, 2004, Prakash & Potoski, 2007, Prakash & Potoski, 2006 that the diffusion of ISO environmental standards has challenged the pollution haven hypothesis. Private regulatory arrangements have attracted considerable academic and policymaking interest, as a wide range of company-sponsored regulatory arrangements have proliferated (Mayer & Gereffi, 2010). ...
Multinational enterprises operating global value chains are being increasingly pressured to source from suppliers that adopt green private standards. Likewise, public policymakers are also pressured to reduce national pollution levels to contribute to sustainable development initiatives. In this context, while there is extensive debate on how domestic, country-specific environmental regulations interact with private standards (adopted by firms) in reducing national pollution levels, less is known about the role of international trade policies, which have recently embraced an array of sustainability issues. Our paper seeks to extend our understanding of the extent to which ISO environmental certifications affect a country’s level of emissions of greenhouse gases and air pollutants, and whether the European Union’s environmental protection (EP) standards – as mediated through trade agreements – condition this response. Prior research provides mixed evidence on the impact of the adoption of ISO-14001 on pollution reduction. Based on prior literature and using institutional theory and environmental stewardship perspectives, we expect that membership of trade agreements with EP provisions would complement the effect of ISO-14001 uptakes in reducing national pollution levels. Our arguments and results emphasize the complexity between private and public regulations on pollution reduction.
... 2014; To and Lee, 2014;Berliner and Prakash, 2013;Delmas and Montiel, 2008;Prakash and Potoski, 2007;Massoud et al., 2010); relation between ISO 14001 systems and other environmental management systems as well as systems for management in other areas like quality, safety (Testa et al., 2014;Granly and Welo, 2014;Neugebauer, 2012;Low Sui and Tan, 2005;Heras and Arana, 2010); enhancement of environmental management systems in line with ISO 14001 and its impact on their efficiency and effectiveness (Matuszak-Flejszman, 2010); evaluation of environmental audit quality (Prajogo et al., 2016;Heras-Saizabitoria et al., 2013); comparing the outcomes of environmental and financial operations of businesses which have implemented ISO 14001 EMSs and those which have not done it (Zobel, 2013;Naudé et al., 2011;Gomez and Rodriguez, 2011); application of environmental indicators (Comoglio and Botta, 2012); analysis of the human factor significance (commitment of employees, executives, the role of the person responsible for the system) for the efficiency of management in conformity with ISO 14001 (Rodríguezet al., 2011;Perez et al., 2009). The limited number of studies which concerned the analysis of environmental impact of system implementation were devoted to the assessment of the relation between the above and the attributes such as the size of the organisation, its ownership (private/public), sector (manufacturing/ service), stability/changeability of the applied technologies, amount of time for which the system has been in operation in a given organisation, possession of quality management system in conformity with ISO 9001, or finally, the extrinsic/intrinsic motivation for the system implementation (Matuszak-Flejszman, 2010;Prajogo et al., 2012;Boiral and Henri, 2012;Christmann and Taylor, 2006;Fura, 2013;Castka and Prajogo, 2013;Gavronski et al., 2013). ...
... Confronted with a different set of regulatory requirements in each country, they have a strong incentive to pursue regulatory uniformity across jurisdictions to maximize operational efficiency (Vogel 1997;Yaziji 2004). While this dynamic does not imply convergence in specific policy settings-multinationals are likely to reflect the diversity of policy positions of their home countries (Prakash and Potoski 2007)-it does indicate that multinationals should hasten the adoption and shape the spread of policy ideas among the jurisdictions in which they work. ...
In the face of daunting environmental challenges, leadership in the development of environmental policy may be more important now than ever. While some countries are willing to devote substantial time and resources to working on environmental issues, others lag behind. In this dissertation, I explore what it means to be a policy leader, the state and trajectory of environmental policy leadership globally, and which actors systematically catalyze (or obstruct) environmental policy leadership. I propose that policy leadership is an observable, persistent behavior in which a government is 1) innovative, adopting new policies quickly and 2) influential, inspiring other governments to adopt these same policies. I argue that transnational advocates, such as international NGOs and multinational corporations, are particularly well-positioned to strengthen (or weaken) policy leadership. Providing information, building capacity, and conducting pressure campaigns in multiple jurisdictions at the same time, transnational advocates are uniquely positioned to affect both the spread and uptake of new policies. Using novel data on the adoption of 3,000 environmental policies by 185 countries, I measure leadership in the development of environmental policy over time and assess the role of transnational advocates in policy development. I find that large international environmental NGOs spark environmental policy leadership, particularly in developing countries and on issues related to traditional environmental topics of flora, fauna, and pollution. In contrast, lobbying by multinational corporations in developed countries sharply reduces environmental policy leadership. These results demonstrate the substantial and varied impacts of transnational advocacy on environmental policy leadership. I make three notable contributions in this dissertation. First, I improve on prior conceptualizations of policy leadership, providing a definition that is straightforward to operationalize while speaking to more general understandings of leadership. Second, I develop a novel method for identifying policy adoptions from a compilation of laws and regulations; this generates a new database of environmental policy adoptions that overcomes the geographic and topical limitations of existing datasets. Finally, I contribute the first systematic, quantitative evidence of the impact of transnational advocates on policy change, demonstrating the importance of their activities for environmental policy development. With little time to waste, it is critical to understand why and when governments act as environmental policy leaders, and what can be done to facilitate environmental policy leadership. Through this research, it is clear that accounting for the activities of transnational advocates should be a key component of any attempt to catalyze proactive and meaningful environmental policy change.
... This is a consideration for investors, especially in the foreign direct investment segment, where many foreign investors consider the sustainability of an entity as a result of the products produced. In empirical research it is found that foreign investment companies are more likely to implement an environmental management system (EMS) (Albornoz et al., 2011) and (Prakash & Potoski, 2007). He (2010) found that there is a positive relationship between foreign direct investment and environmental efficiency practices. ...
This research aims to examine the determination of the Environmental Management System (EMS) and environmental performance on the company's financial performance as moderated by foreign ownership in the stock structure of manufacturing companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange. This research uses a quantitative method by analyzing 27 manufacturing companies listed on the IDX through purposive sampling-based sample selection, then data analysis using the moderated regression analysis method. The results showed that foreign ownership could not moderate the effect of EMS proxied by ISO 14001 certification on the financial performance of the entity proxied by ROA, but on the other hand, the structure of foreign ownership shares could positively and significantly moderate the effect of environmental performance proxied by PROPER KLHK. on the entity's financial performance. Meanwhile, if tested directly, neither EMS nor environmental performance has an effect on the company's financial performance.
... First, it attempts to analyze the dynamic relationship between urbanization, globalization, economic growth, energy consumption, and carbon dioxide emissions in the case of Mozambique. Second, previous studies measured globalization by trade openness in relation to an increase or decrease in environmental emissions (Antweiler, Copeland, and Scott Taylor 2001;Frankel and Romer 1999;Copeland and Scott Taylor 2003;Prakash and Potoski 2007;Le, Chang, and Park 2016), whereas this study uses the globalization index, which is constructed from three subindices (social, economic, and political globalization) from the KOF index to evaluate its impact on CO 2 emissions (Jorgenson and Givens 2014;Lim, Menaldo, and Prakash 2015;Lv and Xu 2018;Salahuddin et al. 2019). Third, the researcher used multivariate econometric techniques such as the Augmented Dickey-Fuller test (ADF) and Phillips-Perron (PP) unit root tests, the Johansen cointegration test, the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bound test, and the Toda-Yamamoto causality test and then checked the impact countrywise. ...
This study was designed to investigate the nexus between urbanization, globalization, and CO2 emissions in Mozambique using time series data for the period 1980–2013. A bound testing approach to cointegration and error correction models of an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model was applied for long-run relationships, and the Toda–Yamamoto causality test was used for causal analysis. The ARDL coefficients indicated that GDP per capita, globalization, and urbanization induce CO2 emissions in the long run, whereas access to electricity reduces emissions. Moreover, access to electricity, GDP per capita, and urbanization enhance carbon emissions in the short run. A bidirectional causality exists between globalization and CO2 emissions. Thus, appropriate green development programs that promote renewable energy should be designed to enhance environmental quality in urban areas. Further, designing sustainable urban planning policies and maintaining a sustainable lifestyle are recommended.
Since the Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, ISO 14001 has become an internationally recognized environmental management system that has spread all over the world. The existing literature has examined in detail the motivations, benefits, and challenges of ISO 14001 adoption in developed countries. However, there is a relative lack of studies on the adoption of ISO 14001 by the subsidiaries of multinational corporations (MNCs) in developing countries, and in Thailand in particular. This paper investigates the motivations, benefits, and challenges of ISO 14001 adoption at Japanese subsidiaries in Thailand based on the results of a questionnaire survey of 100 subsidiaries and a semi‐structured interview survey of 11 subsidiaries. We find that the main motivations are pressures by the national and local governments, as well as by the customers. In addition to the tax incentives, the main benefits are gaining competitiveness, enhancing the corporate image, and maintaining efficient management. We also identify the following challenges: the costs of ISO 14001 adoption, and the training and awareness of the employees. Compared with the existing literature, we find some new motivations, benefits, and challenges related to the local context of ISO 14001 adoption. Although our results are valid only for the Japanese subsidiaries in Thailand, the in‐depth understanding of the motivations, benefits, and challenges of ISO 14001 adoption may contribute to the expanding literature about corporate environmental behavior toward sustainable development.
The purpose of this study is to review the knowledge base on the relationship that is shared between multinationals’ host nation and their origin nation from 1994 to 2022. Literature was primarily gathered from Scopus using key words and quantitatively analyzed thereafter. To gather the sample for this article, the PRISMA technique was applied, and VOSviewer was used to execute the bibliometric analysis. The result shows the highly cited articles and terminology that have been deemed popular throughout the span of the research period, in addition to the highest publishing nations and further gaps and opportunities for future research. The results will help researchers and stakeholders alike move forward with further studies in this field of research by filling the existing gaps as provided in this paper and extending the existing knowledge base.
Since the 2000s, China has deepened public relations in its engagement with Africa primarily through economic investment and assistance. The present work looks at China’s African public relations and the mechanism that shapes public perception of China, focusing on Mali. Mali is not a major destination for Chinese investment, yet public perceptions of China appear to be uniquely positive. How may we explain this trajectory? The work undertakes a longitudinal examination, comparing China’s economic developments in Mali (2010–20) with Malians’ perception of China’s influence on the Malian economy that shapes the general perception and attitude towards China (2010–20) and the media’s role in this process. Some questions guide this study: how do Chinese economic activities in Mali shape Malians’ perception of China? How does the media contribute (if any) to shaping Malian perception of China’s developmental programmes? Employing a mixed research method and a range of datasets, I find that economic investment does not necessarily shape positive public perception of China in Mali. Instead, how the public receives information about economic investments shapes and enhances a positive perception of China in Mali. Consequently, China would substantially enhance its image-building effort when its foreign economic development assistance is linked with public relations, making economic programmes more visible through media representations. I based the theoretical discussion on the media agenda-setting framework.
Previous studies have shown an ambivalent relationship between standards and innovation while emphasizing the need to clarify the relationship and uncover their possible causal link. This paper revisits the standard-innovation relationship with the ISO 9001 standard, and patents applications as indicators of standards and innovation, respectively. Using a panel dataset of 81 countries covering the period 1993-2019, we find that ISO 9001 certification is positively associated with innovation. Our fixed-effects and system GMM estimates show that doubling the number of ISO 9001 certificates obtained at the national level increases innovation by 1.3-2.2%. The results vary according to the edition of the standard and the countries’ level of development, whereby developed countries seemed to benefit more from the international quality management standards. The paper also suggests that official development assistance (ODA) may be a vehicle through which wealthier countries can help developing ones harness the benefits of standardization.
This article compares different measures of democracy to determine how they impact breach of contract risk, especially in postcolonial states that are more likely to suffer from neopatrimonialism with their imported state apparatus. By demonstrating how the normative measure of democracy, which emphasises respect for civil liberties, is more impactful in reducing breach of contract risk than the procedural measure that emphasises institutions, this article highlights the nonoptimal consequences of institutionalised democratisation without the normative dimension. The main findings are that while there is significant variation between the normative and procedural measures of democracy, it is increases in the normative measure of democracy that better promote accountability and the rule of law, thereby more effectively reducing breach of contract risk. We conclude that democratic norms must parallel the progress for democratic form so to enable better (lower) breach of contract risk.
The mushrooming of trade agreements and their interlinkages with environmental governance calls for new research on the trade and environment interface. The more than 700 existing preferential trade agreements (PTAs) include ever more diverse and far-reaching environmental provisions. While missed opportunities remain and harmful provisions persist, numerous environmental provisions in PTAs entail promising potential. They promote the implementation of environmental treaties and cover numerous environmental issues. New concepts, data, and methods, including detailed content analysis across multiple institutions, are needed to explain these interlinkages and understand whether and how PTAs with environmental provisions can contribute to tackling global environmental challenges. Making use of the most extensive coding of environmental provisions in PTAs to date and combining quantitative data with qualitative analyses, this Element provides a comprehensive yet fine-grained picture of the drivers and effects of environmental provisions in PTAs. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
The structure and governance of global supply chains not only shape social and environmental outcomes for both countries and firms, but also affect the quality of life at the local level, for those who live and work at each site of production. Existing literature on supply chain governance focuses on the transnational firm and has yielded a wide range of theoretical and empirical findings about firm- and nation-level outcomes. However, we know less about the drivers of variation in more localized social and environmental outcomes across production sites, which may result from local, national, and global actors and institutions that may interact. I provide a brief overview of the dominant literature on supply chain governance, highlighting the tendency to take an actor-centric approach. I then identify opportunities to study local social and environmental consequences of networked production using a more explicitly multi-actor and multi-level approach that can allow us to identify potential trade-offs, double wins, or spillovers between social and environmental outcomes.
Although ethics -which emerged as a philosophical discipline from morality- seems to be a modern world concept but there is no doubt that its history is almost as old as the history of humanity. First of all, ethics began to appear in moral debates before emerging as an important theoretical notion. Today, as well as social life, ethical discussions have increased remarkably in professional fields, especially in academia and academic studies. The aim of this study is to determine the relationship between the ethical problematic, which also has an important place academically, and the studies in the field of political science, by subjecting it to bibliometric analysis. The data were analyzed using the “bibliometrix” package in the R-Studio programming language in the R program, which is an open source statistical program. Based on the analyses carried out; The first three authors with the highest h-index for ethics research in the Web of Science database are Allen N. (5), Hutchings K. (5) and Appiah K. A. (12); The first three countries producing the most articles are the USA, the United Kingdom and Australia, while the countries most open to cooperation are Norway, Switzerland, France and China. It has been determined that the top 3 journals in which the articles on this subject are published the most are “Ethics & International Affairs”, “Ethics & Global Politics” and “Political Theory”. The most-frequently-used keywords are ethics (238), politics (102), war (47), justice (48), politics (45), law (41), democracy (33), power (33), state (29).
Previous studies have shown an ambivalent relationship between standards and innovation while emphasizing the need to clarify the relationship and uncover their possible causal link. This paper revisits the standard-innovation relationship with the ISO 9001 standard, and patents applications as indicators of standards and innovation, respectively. Using a panel dataset of 81 countries covering the period 1993-2019, we find that ISO 9001 certification is positively associated with innovation. Our fixed-effects and system GMM estimates show that doubling the number of ISO 9001 certificates obtained at the national level increases innovation by 1.3-2.2%. The results vary according to the edition of the standard and the countries’ level of development, whereby OECD countries seemed to benefit more from the international quality management standards more than non-OECD countries. The paper also suggests that official development assistance (ODA) may be a vehicle through which wealthier countries can help those from the Global South harness the benefits of standardization.
Over the last 25 years, the BRICs asserted themselves as drivers of globalization. But what does their new‐found prominence mean for working conditions at home? Using a novel sub‐national database covering outward investment linkages and working conditions in Brazilian municipalities, this study tests whether a direct investment in Europe leads to the introduction of decent working conditions in Brazil. The empirical results provide strong support for the investing‐up effect using a mixture of panel data analysis and text analysis. The results suggest that economic integration with high‐standard developed countries can act as a powerful mechanism for labor standard improvements in developing countries.
The factors behind the adoption of ISO 14000 certification by Indian organized manufacturing plants are examined using the Annual Survey of Industries unit-level data for 2016–2018, with supplementary analyses undertaken using such data for 2008–2010 and 2008–2015. While observing that a change in the export status of a plant from non-exporting to exporting will raise its probability of adopting ISO 14000 certification by about 20 percent, the paper also identifies that other plant-level characteristics like size, fuel intensity, financial ability, presence of foreign equity, R&D activity, and adequate managerial staff strength are some of the important drivers of the adoption of ISO 14000 certification. The paper finds that while exporting enhances the probability of adoption of ISO 14000 certification, the probability goes down beyond an export share in the production of 80 percent. The paper adds to the literature by disentangling the pecuniary objectives vis-à-vis the role of environmental and social consciousness of plants’ management in driving the adoption of ISO 14000 certification.
Advocacy organizations are viewed as actors motivated primarily by principled beliefs. This volume outlines a new agenda for the study of advocacy organizations, proposing a model of NGOs as collective actors that seek to fulfil normative concerns and instrumental incentives, face collective action problems, and compete as well as collaborate with other advocacy actors. The analogy of the firm is a useful way of studying advocacy actors because individuals, via advocacy NGOs, make choices which are analytically similar to those that shareholders make in the context of firms. The authors view advocacy NGOs as special types of firms that make strategic choices in policy markets which, along with creating public goods, support organizational survival, visibility, and growth. Advocacy NGOs' strategy can therefore be understood as a response to opportunities to supply distinct advocacy products to well-defined constituencies, as well as a response to normative or principled concerns.
Advocacy organizations are viewed as actors motivated primarily by principled beliefs. This volume outlines a new agenda for the study of advocacy organizations, proposing a model of NGOs as collective actors that seek to fulfil normative concerns and instrumental incentives, face collective action problems, and compete as well as collaborate with other advocacy actors. The analogy of the firm is a useful way of studying advocacy actors because individuals, via advocacy NGOs, make choices which are analytically similar to those that shareholders make in the context of firms. The authors view advocacy NGOs as special types of firms that make strategic choices in policy markets which, along with creating public goods, support organizational survival, visibility, and growth. Advocacy NGOs' strategy can therefore be understood as a response to opportunities to supply distinct advocacy products to well-defined constituencies, as well as a response to normative or principled concerns.
Academics and policymakers frequently discuss global governance but they treat governance as a structure or process, rarely considering who actually does the governing. This volume focuses on the agents of global governance: 'global governors'. The global policy arena is filled with a wide variety of actors such as international organizations, corporations, professional associations, and advocacy groups, all seeking to 'govern' activity surrounding their issues of concern. Who Governs the Globe? lays out a theoretical framework for understanding and investigating governors in world politics. It then applies this framework to various governors and policy arenas, including arms control, human rights, economic development, and global education. Edited by three of the world's leading international relations scholars, this is an important contribution that will be useful for courses, as well as for researchers in international studies and international organizations.
Advocacy organizations are viewed as actors motivated primarily by principled beliefs. This volume outlines a new agenda for the study of advocacy organizations, proposing a model of NGOs as collective actors that seek to fulfil normative concerns and instrumental incentives, face collective action problems, and compete as well as collaborate with other advocacy actors. The analogy of the firm is a useful way of studying advocacy actors because individuals, via advocacy NGOs, make choices which are analytically similar to those that shareholders make in the context of firms. The authors view advocacy NGOs as special types of firms that make strategic choices in policy markets which, along with creating public goods, support organizational survival, visibility, and growth. Advocacy NGOs' strategy can therefore be understood as a response to opportunities to supply distinct advocacy products to well-defined constituencies, as well as a response to normative or principled concerns.
Academics and policymakers frequently discuss global governance but they treat governance as a structure or process, rarely considering who actually does the governing. This volume focuses on the agents of global governance: 'global governors'. The global policy arena is filled with a wide variety of actors such as international organizations, corporations, professional associations, and advocacy groups, all seeking to 'govern' activity surrounding their issues of concern. Who Governs the Globe? lays out a theoretical framework for understanding and investigating governors in world politics. It then applies this framework to various governors and policy arenas, including arms control, human rights, economic development, and global education. Edited by three of the world's leading international relations scholars, this is an important contribution that will be useful for courses, as well as for researchers in international studies and international organizations.
Academics and policymakers frequently discuss global governance but they treat governance as a structure or process, rarely considering who actually does the governing. This volume focuses on the agents of global governance: 'global governors'. The global policy arena is filled with a wide variety of actors such as international organizations, corporations, professional associations, and advocacy groups, all seeking to 'govern' activity surrounding their issues of concern. Who Governs the Globe? lays out a theoretical framework for understanding and investigating governors in world politics. It then applies this framework to various governors and policy arenas, including arms control, human rights, economic development, and global education. Edited by three of the world's leading international relations scholars, this is an important contribution that will be useful for courses, as well as for researchers in international studies and international organizations.
Academics and policymakers frequently discuss global governance but they treat governance as a structure or process, rarely considering who actually does the governing. This volume focuses on the agents of global governance: 'global governors'. The global policy arena is filled with a wide variety of actors such as international organizations, corporations, professional associations, and advocacy groups, all seeking to 'govern' activity surrounding their issues of concern. Who Governs the Globe? lays out a theoretical framework for understanding and investigating governors in world politics. It then applies this framework to various governors and policy arenas, including arms control, human rights, economic development, and global education. Edited by three of the world's leading international relations scholars, this is an important contribution that will be useful for courses, as well as for researchers in international studies and international organizations.
The Power of Human Rights (published in 1999) was an innovative and influential contribution to the study of international human rights. At its center was a 'spiral model' of human rights change which described the various socialization processes through which international norms were internalized into the domestic practices of various authoritarian states during the Cold War years. The Persistent Power of Human Rights builds on these insights, extending its reach and analysis. It updates our understanding of the various causal mechanisms and conditions which produce behavioural compliance, and expands the range of rights-violating actors examined to include democratic and authoritarian Great Powers, corporations, guerrilla groups, and private actors. Using a unique blend of quantitative and qualitative research and theory, this book yields not only important new academic insights but also a host of useful lessons for policy-makers and practitioners.
The Power of Human Rights (published in 1999) was an innovative and influential contribution to the study of international human rights. At its center was a 'spiral model' of human rights change which described the various socialization processes through which international norms were internalized into the domestic practices of various authoritarian states during the Cold War years. The Persistent Power of Human Rights builds on these insights, extending its reach and analysis. It updates our understanding of the various causal mechanisms and conditions which produce behavioural compliance, and expands the range of rights-violating actors examined to include democratic and authoritarian Great Powers, corporations, guerrilla groups, and private actors. Using a unique blend of quantitative and qualitative research and theory, this book yields not only important new academic insights but also a host of useful lessons for policy-makers and practitioners.
The Power of Human Rights (published in 1999) was an innovative and influential contribution to the study of international human rights. At its center was a 'spiral model' of human rights change which described the various socialization processes through which international norms were internalized into the domestic practices of various authoritarian states during the Cold War years. The Persistent Power of Human Rights builds on these insights, extending its reach and analysis. It updates our understanding of the various causal mechanisms and conditions which produce behavioural compliance, and expands the range of rights-violating actors examined to include democratic and authoritarian Great Powers, corporations, guerrilla groups, and private actors. Using a unique blend of quantitative and qualitative research and theory, this book yields not only important new academic insights but also a host of useful lessons for policy-makers and practitioners.
The Power of Human Rights (published in 1999) was an innovative and influential contribution to the study of international human rights. At its center was a 'spiral model' of human rights change which described the various socialization processes through which international norms were internalized into the domestic practices of various authoritarian states during the Cold War years. The Persistent Power of Human Rights builds on these insights, extending its reach and analysis. It updates our understanding of the various causal mechanisms and conditions which produce behavioural compliance, and expands the range of rights-violating actors examined to include democratic and authoritarian Great Powers, corporations, guerrilla groups, and private actors. Using a unique blend of quantitative and qualitative research and theory, this book yields not only important new academic insights but also a host of useful lessons for policy-makers and practitioners.
We explore the role of ISO 14001 certification in stimulating increased exports for certified firms. The rationale for the study is that certification conveys an important market signal that the certified firm's production process adheres to internationally accepted standards of environmental quality. That is, the perceived credibility of ISO 14001 certification lowers informational barriers about the environmental attributes of the certified firm's products, especially in foreign markets, boosting exports. We put this proposition to an empirical test using the gravity trade model and a panel of South Korean manufacturing industries exporting to 176 countries over the 1988–2015 period. Our results show that ISO 14001 certification generates a robust positive push effect for South Korean manufacturing exports. We further find that this effect varies based on the level of economic development of the destination market, with a more pronounced impact of certification on exports to high‐income countries than to middle and lower income countries.
When, how, and why do regional organizatiosns provide democracy, human rights, and rule of law institutions? The chapter introduces the reader to the repertoire of regional institutions to promote and protect fundamental governance standards in member states of regional organizations. It argues that demands and diffusion explain the adoption and design of regional institutions. Demands and diffusion occur at the same time, but their combinations play out differently across the type of adopter (pioneers, early followers, late adopters) and the instance of designing institutions (adoption, first institutional design, subsequent institutional designs). Because of the interplay of demands and diffusion, demands can be considered both enabling factors for and constraining factors of diffusion: demand-following pioneers set the path for diffusion, but demands of affected early followers and late adopters constrain diffusion processes.
The past three decades have witnessed rapid economic development, particularly in countries that have pursued relatively open economic policies. Rising environmental awareness in the 1960s also led to a rapid tightening of pollution regulation in the industrial economies. According to the "pollution havens" hypothesis, the result should have been more rapid growth of dirty industries in unregulated economies that were open to international trade. Using data for the period 1960 to 1995, the authors find that the displacement of pollution to developing countries has not been a major phenomenon for several reasons. Tendencies toward formation of pollution havens have been self-limiting because economic growth has generated countervailing effects through increases in regulation, technical expertise, and investment in cleaner production. In practice, the authors argue that pollution havens have apparently been as transient as low-wage havens.
Since the collapse of communism the states of postcommunist Europe and Asia have defined for themselves, and have had defined for them, two primary tasks: the construction of viable market economies and the establishment of working institutions of representative democracy. The variation in political and economic outcomes in the postcommunist space makes it, without question, the most diverse "region" in the world. What explains the variation? All of the big winners of postcommunism share the trait of being geographically close to the former border of the noncommunist world. Even controlling for cultural differences, historical legacies, and paths of extrication, the spatial effect remains consistent and strong across the universe of postcommunist cases. This suggests the spatially dependent nature of the diffusion of norms, resources, and institutions that are necessary to the construction of political democracies and market economies in the postcommunist era. The authors develop and adduce evidence for the spatial dependence hypothesis, test it against rival hypotheses, and illustrate the relationships at work through three theoretically important case studies.
Multinational corporations (MNCs) have provoked considerable debate about the issues of "efficiency" and "social justice." The simultaneous surge in economic growth and inequality has led to serious implications for economic rights in developing countries. Using a rights-based perspective, we argue that in the human rights area the responsible party is generally the state. In the context of neoliberal globalization, however, the wrongdoers are often corporations. Reliance on state duties alone may not be sufficient to broadly protect human rights. Certain corporate behaviors are detrimental to internationally recognized norms of human rights. Although private actions, media exposure, and lawsuits based on civil law appear to be the only practical way to put the pressure on MNCs, it is important to examine the possibility of an outside governing body to hold in check unfettered global capitalism and to bring accountability to MNCs' policies that are socially detrimental.
Standards have become one of the most important nontariff barriers to trade, especially national product standards that specify design or performance characteristics of manufactured goods. Divergent national standards often inhibit trade, whereas regional and international standards increasingly serve as instruments of trade liberalization. Consequently, the setting of international standards—seemingly technical and apolitical—is rapidly becoming an issue of economic and political salience. But who sets international standards? Who wins, who loses? This article offers a fresh analytical approach to the study of international standards, which the authors call the institutional complementarities approach. It builds on insights from realism and the “Battle of the Sexes” coordination game but emphasizes complementarities of historically conditioned standardization systems at the national level with the institutional structure of standardization at the international level. It posits that, after controlling for other factors that influence involvement in international standardization, differences in institutional complementarities play a critical though largely accidental role in placing firms from different countries or regions in a first- or second-mover position when standardization becomes global. The authors illustrate the insightfulness of this approach through statistical analyses of the first scientific set of data on standards use and standardization, collected by the authors through an international online survey.
Applying the new economics of organization and relational theories of the firm to the problem of understanding cross‐national variation in the political economy, this volume elaborates a new understanding of the institutional differences that characterize the ‘varieties of capitalism’ found among the developed economies. Building on a distinction between ‘liberal market economies’ and ‘coordinated market economies’, it explores the impact of these variations on economic performance and many spheres of policy‐making, including macroeconomic policy, social policy, vocational training, legal decision‐making, and international economic negotiations. The volume examines the institutional complementarities across spheres of the political economy, including labour markets, markets for corporate finance, the system of skill formation, and inter‐firm collaboration on research and development that reinforce national equilibria and give rise to comparative institutional advantages, notably in the sphere of innovation where LMEs are better placed to sponsor radical innovation and CMEs to sponsor incremental innovation. By linking managerial strategy to national institutions, the volume builds a firm‐centred comparative political economy that can be used to assess the response of firms and governments to the pressures associated with globalization. Its new perspectives on the welfare state emphasize the role of business interests and of economic systems built on general or specific skills in the development of social policy. It explores the relationship between national legal systems, as well as systems of standards setting, and the political economy. The analysis has many implications for economic policy‐making, at national and international levels, in the global age.
Contents BOLI JOHN THOMAS GEORGE M. Part One: 1. BOLI JOHN THOMAS GEORGE M. 2. BOLI JOHN LOYA THOMAS A. LOFTIN TERESA Part Two: 3. FRANK DAVID JOHN HIRONAKA ANN MEYER JOHN W. SCHOFER EVAN TUMA NANCY BRANDON 4. BERKOVITCH NITZA 5. KIM YOUNG S. 6. FINNEMORE MARTHA Part Three: 7. LOYA THOMAS A. BOLI JOHN 8. BARRETT DEBORAH FRANK DAVID JOHN 9. CHABBOTT COLETTE 10. SCHOFER EVAN BOLI JOHN
Voluntary programs have become widespread tools for governments and nongovernmental actors looking to improve industry's environmental and regulatory performance. Voluntary programs can be conceptualized as club goods that provide nonrival but potentially excludable benefits to members. For firms, the value of joining a green club over taking the same actions unilaterally is to appropriate the club's positive brand reputation. Our analysis of about 3,700 U.S. facilities indicates that joining ISO 14001, an important nongovernmental voluntary program, improves facilities' compliance with government regulations. We conjecture that ISO 14001 is effective because its broad positive standing with external audiences provides a reputational benefit that helps induce facilities to take costly progressive environmental action they would not take unilaterally.
The present world order involves a more ‘liberalized’ and commodified set of historical structures, driven by the restructuring of capital and a political shift to the right. This process involves the spatial expansion and social deepening of economic liberal definitions of social purpose and possessively individualist patterns of action and politics.Current transformations can be related to Braudel’s concept of the ‘longue duree’, in so far as the structure and language of social relations is now more conditioned by the long-term commodity logic of capital. Capitalist norms and practices pervade the gestes repetes of everyday life in a more systematic way than in the era of welfare-nationalism and state capitalism (from the 1930s to the 1960s), so that it may be apposite to speak of the emergence of what I call a ‘market civilization’.
Plan of the Book. Introduction: Environmental Management.Part 1: BETWEEN REGULATION AND SELF-REGULATION.1. Business Perspectives on Regulation. 2. International Policy and Voluntary Initiatives. 3. Strategies and The Environment.Part 2: FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE.4. Environmental Management Systems and Standards. 5. Environmental Reporting. 6. Environmental Management Accounting. 7. Conclusions: Dilemmas of Environmental Management. Bibliography. Index.
We examine the reduced-form relationship between per capita income and various environmental indicators. Our study covers
four types of indicators: urban air pollution, the state of the oxygen regime in river basins, fecal contamination of river
basins, and contamination of river basins by heavy metals. We find no evidence that environmental quality deteriorates steadily
with economic growth. Rather, for most indicators, economic growth brings an initial phase of deterioration followed by a
subsequent phase of improvement. The turning points for the different pollutants vary, but in most cases they come before
a country reaches a per capita income of $8000.
Institution theory and the resource-based theory of the firm represent two explanations of how organizations adapt to institutional change. These two theories are compared, contrasted, and applied to the context of environmental management. Arguments based on the theories are used to generate hypotheses about the diffusion and efficacy of the ISO 14001 system, a set of voluntary environmental standards. Empirical tests of the factors lying behind adoption of the ISO 14001 standards and whether or not the standards lead to toxic emissions reductions are conducted on a set of 316 electronics facilities located in the United States. Results support the idea that the standards allow facilities to "catch-up" to best practices if they are an especially high producer of toxic emissions. The paper ties the analysis back to current strategic management theories about organizations and institutional change, and then concludes by assessing the value of ISO 14001 versus traditional government regulation from the point of view of professionals and policy-makers.
Multinational corporations are using cheap Third World labor to avoid the high labor standards of developed nations. The time is ripe for a global New Deal that protects the rights of all workers.
With the publication of his best-selling books "Competitive Strategy (1980) and "Competitive Advantage (1985), Michael E. Porter of the Harvard Business School established himself as the world's leading authority on competitive advantage. Now, at a time when economic performance rather than military might will be the index of national strength, Porter builds on the seminal ideas of his earlier works to explore what makes a nation's firms and industries competitive in global markets and propels a whole nation's economy. In so doing, he presents a brilliant new paradigm which, in addition to its practical applications, may well supplant the 200-year-old concept of "comparative advantage" in economic analysis of international competitiveness. To write this important new work, Porter and his associates conducted in-country research in ten leading nations, closely studying the patterns of industry success as well as the company strategies and national policies that achieved it. The nations are Britain, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea, Singapore, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States. The three leading industrial powers are included, as well as other nations intentionally varied in size, government policy toward industry, social philosophy, and geography. Porter's research identifies the fundamental determinants of national competitive advantage in an industry, and how they work together as a system. He explains the important phenomenon of "clustering," in which related groups of successful firms and industries emerge in one nation to gain leading positions in the world market. Among the over 100 industries examined are the German chemical and printing industries, Swisstextile equipment and pharmaceuticals, Swedish mining equipment and truck manufacturing, Italian fabric and home appliances, and American computer software and movies. Building on his theory of national advantage in industries and clusters, Porter identifies the stages of competitive development through which entire national economies advance and decline. Porter's finding are rich in implications for both firms and governments. He describes how a company can tap and extend its nation's advantages in international competition. He provides a blueprint for government policy to enhance national competitive advantage and also outlines the agendas in the years ahead for the nations studied. This is a work which will become the standard for all further discussions of global competition and the sources of the new wealth of nations.
We use panel data on ISO 9000 quality certification in 85 countries between 1993 and 1998 to better understand the cross-national diffusion of an organizational practice. Following neoinstitutional theory, we focus on the coercive, normative, and mimetic effects that result from the exposure of firms in a given country to a powerful source of critical resources, a common pool of relevant technical knowledge, and the experiences of firms located in other countries. We use social network theory to develop a systematic conceptual understanding of how firms located in different countries influence each other's rates of adoption as a result of cohesive and equivalent network relationships. Regression results provide support for our predictions that states and foreign multinationals are the key actors responsible for coercive isomorphism, cohesive trade relationships between countries generate coercive and normative effects, and role-equivalent trade relationships result in learning-based and competitive imitation.
Contradictions associated with the growth in the power of capital suggest that the prevailing discourse and forces of globalising neoliberalism may have failed to gain more than temporary dominance or supremacy. A period of global recomposition of social forces may be emerging to reconfigure world order. A central task of global political economy is to theorise possibilities for a democratic transformation of world order, in the context of consciousness, culture, and material life, so as to transcend the oxymoron of neoliberal 'market civilisation'.
Abstract The past few years have witnessed an increasing global interest in ISO 9000 standards. Thousands of companies have already been certified. However, doubts have been raised about the effectiveness of ISO 9000 standards for infusing quality within organizations. In this paper, we empirically explore, in the international context, the relationship between ISO 9000 and the level of quality management practices and quality results. Our findings indicate that ISO 9000 registered companies exhibit higher levels of quality leadership, information and analysis, strategic quality planning, human resource development, quality assurance, supplier relationships, customer orientation and quality results.
Political scientists are often called upon to estimate models in which the standard assumption that the data are conditionally independent can be called into question. I review the method of generalized estimating equations (GEE) for dealing with such correlated data. The GEE approach offers a number of advantages to researchers interested in modeling correlated data, including applicability to data in which the outcome variable takes on a wide range of forms. In addition, GEE models allow for substantial flexibility in specifying the correlation structure within cases and offer the potential for valuable substantive insights into the nature of that correlation. Moreover, GEE models are estimable with many currently available software packages, and the interpretation of model estimates is identical to that for commonly used models for uncorrelated data (e.g., logit and probit). I discuss practical issues relating to the use of GEE models and illustrate their usefulness for analyzing correlated data through three applications in political science.
Obra que reconstruye el origen y evolución de las actuales redes transnacionales que, con la utilización de las nuevas tecnologías informativas como recurso organizador y aglutinador, han logrado constituirse en movimientos más o menos presionadores en la defensa de los derechos humanos, de la protección ambiental y de una mayor equidad de género, entre otros.
Increasing attention to environmental management has raised many new dilemmas for firms. How can managers deal with environmental issues in a competitive situation that is international and heterogeneous? What are the strategic and financial implications of environmental management? How can they cope with regulation, considering the choices which range from compliance to voluntary initiatives? And how do other firms organise their environmental management and communicate with stakeholders? This book examines these different topics, without dogma or prescription. It demonstrates the complexity of an area in which there are often no right or easy answers. The Economics of Environmental Management: 7 shows the links between the main functional areas of a business and environmental management; 7 examines regulation and self-regulation in different countries and worldwide; 7 pays specific attention to multinational enterprises; 7 gives an international state of the art on environmental management systems and standards (especially ISO 14001 and EMAS); on environmental reporting and verification; and on environmental management accounting; 7 contains international case examples and a wealth of annotated references to paper and electronic sources.
This article examines the proposition that MNCs from a particular country are likely to exhibit profile similarities that are distinct from those of MNCs emanating from another country due to differences in home country factors. We call this “country of origin effect” (COE). A generalized framework is presented briefly explaining the nature of relationships among various COE elements that influence MNC strategy. A number of research propositions are offered that postulate the presumed effect of COE elements on MNC strategy and competitive behavior. Finally, suggestions are made as to the implications of this avenue of enquiry for further research as well as guide for management action.
Globalization critics argue that international trade spurs a race to the bottom among national environmental standards. ISO 14001 is the most widely adopted voluntary environmental regulation which encourages firms to take environmental action beyond what domestic government regulations require. Drawing on a panel study of 108 countries over seven years, we investigate conditions under which trade linkages can encourage ISO 14001 adoption, thereby countering environmental races to the bottom. We find that trade linkages encourage ISO 14001 adoption if countries' major export markets have adopted this voluntary regulation.
To test the claims of U.S. industries that environmental regulations would have adverse effects on profits and damage competitive market positions, an analysis was performed on foreign investments by U.S. companies involved in the highly polluting chemical and mineral processing industries. Widespread relocation to foreign countries was not detected. In a few specialized areas of the chemical industry involving particularly hazardous processes there has been some movement to countries which have less stringent pollution regulations. However, more awareness of environmental hazards has produced stricter control of environmental pollution in those same countries. The dramatic political changes in Eastern Europe may result in a large increase in U.S. industrial investment in the Warsaw Pact countries. There is a temptation to take a short view and conform to the lax environmental regulations of these countries which have produced grave industrial pollution problems. Investment should be directed towards pollution-free production not only in the Eastern European countries but also in the U.S.
In the next ten years, who will win and who will lose from globalization? In thinking about this question, I avoid speculating on the broad impact of globalization on economic outcomes. Instead, I limit my treatment to the impact of multinational corporations (MNCs) on developed and developing countries, especially how competition to attract firms affects domestic politics and national economies.Nathan Jensen (njensen@artsci.wustl.edu) is assistant professor of political science at Washington University in St. Louis. The author thanks Sophie Fortin, Geoff Garrett, Quan Li, René Lindstädt, Bill Lowry, Guillermo Rosas, Andy Sobel, and Jana von Stein for their comments and suggestions.