Organizational Purpose, Ideology, and Carbon Emissions

Abstract

Which characteristics make companies differ in their stances toward the reduction of carbon emissions? Carbon neutrality entails a drastic technological and organizational change, and specific internal drivers may endorse its effectiveness. Recent literature proposes that organizational purpose can function to advance organizational efforts towards sustainability; however, not much is known about the condition through which this relationship can be effective. In this paper, I build on the open polity perspective on organizations and propose that organizational carbon emissions reduction may stem from interactions between the prevailing values and beliefs among the body politic of the firm. Specifically, I look at organizational purpose and political ideology as explanatory variables towards reducing carbon emissions. I gathered data from Glassdoor reviews to measure employees' perception about the organization's purpose and the Federal Election Commission (FEC), which provides individual contributions to political parties. My preliminary results show that organizational purpose and ideology (i.e., liberal vs. conservative firms) alone do not explain significant differences towards CO2 reductions. However, when mediated, I find that liberal organizations with high employee perception of organizational purpose explain substantial reductions in carbon emissions.