Corporate Capitalism Research Articles

‘Never the twain shall cross’: scripts of children's play and adult desire in Barbie

Greta Gerwig's Barbie (2023) is deeply invested in the liberatory and transformative potential of children's play. Children's play in Barbie is the site of self-actualisation for adult women, whereby the subversive potential of Barbie-play facilitates nostalgia, self-discovery and choice for the film's adult protagonists. This move towards self-actualisation is core to Barbie's feminist ethic, which I argue is a type of ‘commodity feminism’ that reasons that such female empowerment can be marketed and purchased. The invocation of the playing child throughout Barbie, accompanied by scant representations of actual playing children, is central to this ethic, performing what Jacqueline Rose calls a ‘mystification of the child’ as a product of adult desires and anxieties. In Barbie, children's play is a blank screen onto which can be projected adult female desires for self-actualisation, concealing concomitant anxieties about the role of capitalist patriarchy in this commodity-feminist project. Drawing on Robin Bernstein's conception of dolls as ‘scriptive things’, I explore how Barbie and its doll characters script forms of play. I demonstrate that the rhetorical power of children's play can be co-opted into feminism and corporate capitalism alike, and used to disguise the uneasy but often very profitable marriage between the two.

Carbon Assurance, Corporate Capital Structure, and Debt Maturity: Global Evidence

This study used a cross-country sample of firms from 47 nations that participated in the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) questionnaire over the years 2011 and 2020, to examine whether the verification of carbon emissions information by an independent third party affects corporate capital structure and debt maturity decisions. Using alternative methods and robustness checks, we explore that carbon assurance importantly shapes both corporate capital structure and debt maturity. In particular, firms that are involved in independent carbon assurance have significantly higher leverage in their capital structure compared to non-assured firms. Further, assured firms have better access to long-term debt compared to non-assured firms. The outcomes of this study are attributed to the notion that the verification of carbon information increases the creditability of a firm's voluntary reporting and reduces its informational asymmetry between corporations and lenders.

Learning by exporting: the moderating role of employee human capital

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to explore the means by which exporters foster innovation via the learning-by-exporting effect and to appraise the moderating role of employee human capital in the export–innovation relationship.Design/methodology/approachLeveraging the linked-survey-secondary data from the Human Capital Corporate Panel (HCCP) spanning 2011–2017, with 890 observations from 228 Korean exporters, this study utilizes Generalized Least Squares (GLS) regression to empirically test the proposed hypotheses.FindingsThe results indicate that exporting significantly boosts a firm’s innovation performance by encouraging the generation of new concepts in products, services, technologies and/or production lines. Moreover, the presence of international talent and highly educated staff positively moderates the relationship between export intensity and innovation performance.Originality/valueBy integrating organizational learning and human capital theories, this study yields theoretical and managerial insights by elucidating the roles of exporting and human capital in advancing innovation performance, thereby guiding corporate export strategies and human resource policies.

What causes polarized stagnation, corporate economy, or welfare state?: Insights from new development economics

AbstractThis study explores polarized economic stagnation from the perspective of a capitalist corporate economy. It introduces two institutional policy paradigms: economic differentiation (ED) and economic egalitarianism (EE). ED‐friendly “market democracy” promotes shared growth, whereas EE‐friendly “egalitarian democracy” leads to polarized stagnation. The corporate economy is portrayed as the epitome of the ED institution leading shared growth, whereas the redistributive welfare state based on EE institutions could bring polarized stagnation. Empirical analysis tests these hypotheses and discovers that the world's polarized stagnation may be linked to “welfare policy under egalitarian democracy” rather than “corporate growth under market democracy” as commonly thought.

The Economic Impact of Water Vulnerability on Corporate Sustainability: A Perspective of Corporate Capital Cost

Studies have argued that water risk affects corporate sustainability, but few of them have fully explored whether or not and how water resources have a direct impact on corporate finance and strategy. This study takes the listed companies in the Chinese A-share market from 2019 to 2023 as a sample to understand the threat of water vulnerability to corporate sustainability from the perspective of capital cost. This study argues that water vulnerability positively relates to corporate capital cost by increasing corporate financing constraints. Meanwhile, this study also examines the role of water regulation and water investment in the relationship between water vulnerability and corporate capital cost. Water regulation brings legitimate pressure to corporations and increases the transformation risks faced by them, so it has a positive moderating effect. Water investment can alleviate the vulnerability of local water resources and reduce the physical water risk faced by corporations, so it has a negative moderating effect. The study finds that the two measures mainly play a significant moderating effect on the cost of debt. In addition, the study finds that the positive relationship between water vulnerability and capital cost has industrial and firm-level heterogeneity, while the moderating effect of government water governance has only industrial heterogeneity.

Beyond simplistic narratives: Dynamic farmers, precarity and the politics of agribusiness expansion

AbstractAgribusiness expansion is usually framed around two competing narratives. On the one hand, advocates present it as a promising vehicle to modernise agriculture and integrate small farmers into global value chains. On the other hand, critics denounce it as a top‐down corporate assault to monopolise agriculture and dispossess peasants of land. Despite their differences, these contrasting narratives tend to share a reductionistic capital‐centric bias as they are mainly focused on the alleged benefits/dangers of the ‘arrival’ of agribusiness corporate capital. Although simplistic, these narratives have been politically effective in shaping the public debate and thus should be exposed to critical challenge. Drawing on my ethnographic research in eastern lowland Bolivia, I show how both narratives fail to capture the complexity of an actually existing agribusiness structure. My grounded analysis of the process of agrarian change focuses on the changing labour dynamics among campesinos who have striven to become prosperous soy producers. Faced with bleak prospects and structural insecurity, they have been articulating a political practice around the notion of precarity. I argue that this emerging politics from below deserves more attention as an important terrain of political struggles of classes of labour.

Impact of Monetary Policy on Corporate Capital Structure Adjustment in a Financial Development Environment

This study aims to investigate the impact of monetary policy on the adjustment of corporate capital structure within the environment of financial development, focusing on listed companies at the Shenzhen Stock Exchange. Utilizing data from 2011 to 2021, the research employs regression analysis and generalized method of moments (GMM) to explore how quantity-based and price-based monetary policies influence capital structure adjustments. The findings indicate that changes in monetary policy significantly affect corporate capital structure adjustments. Specifically, quantity-based monetary policies accelerate these adjustments, though their impact is moderated by the level of financial development. In contrast, price-based monetary policies consistently exert a positive influence on capital structure adjustments. This study contributes to the understanding of monetary policy's role in corporate finance, providing empirical evidence from China's evolving financial market.

Diversity, equity and inclusion work: a difference that makes a difference … ?

PurposeI examine if current diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives can actually accomplish what they aim and claim to do. I argue that perforce they cannot, as they remain instruments of capitalist corporations and other similar structures.Design/methodology/approachI draw on a variety of literature, from poetry to theories and to empirical findings.FindingsDEI work so far does not live up to its hyped-up claims. It is time for scholars and practitioners to question the DEI industrial complex and its influence on organizational dynamics. It is not clear that justice can ever be achieved in a capitalist neoliberal economy.Research limitations/implicationsThe paper is not an empirical paper.Practical implicationsDEI work needs to be re-conceived so that it addresses power imbalances, rather serving as a tool to keep organizations comfortable in seeming to change.Social implicationsDEI practitioners will need to draw deeply on their courage so that they do not reinforce the existing systems of capitalist oppression through their well-intentioned work.Originality/valueThe paper argues that DEI work can accomplish little without a radical reconceptualization of its nature as a genuine tool for change, rather than simply window dressing.

The (geo)politics of controlling shareholders

Abstract In this Article, I extend the analysis of controlling shareholders typically reflected in corporate governance scholarship—which is fundamentally framed in terms of shareholder wealth creation and diversion at the behest of the controller—to the increasing (geo)political significance of firms with controlling shareholders. This effort requires shifting the unit of analysis to the fusion of political-economic power inherent in corporate control and examining the implications of this fusion beyond the boundaries of the firm itself. I illustrate the approach by analyzing examples from a variety of new and old corporate capitalist systems operating globally today, and by surveying numerous policy domains in which firms with controlling shareholders are key protagonists: national security and economic sanctions, stock exchange competition, corporate influence on domestic political systems, and ESG. Expanding the lens through which controlling shareholders are viewed sheds light on their considerable influence in largely unexplored realms of wideranging geostrategic and political importance.

The Impact of Digital Transformation on the Dynamic Adjustment of Corporate Capital Structure

The Impact of Digital Transformation on the Dynamic Adjustment of Corporate Capital Structure

Impact of Corporate Capital Structure on Corporate Performance: An Empirical Study of Emerging Market Using GMM Estimation Technique

This study aims to check the impact of capital structure on nonfinancial firm's performance, which are listed on the Pakistan Stock Exchange. This study used panel data from 06 years of 289 nonfinancial firms from 2017 to 2022 to achieve the goal. This study used two-step Generalized Methods of Moments (GMM), a dynamic analysis model. Five measures are used for firm performance, while two are used for capital structure. This study proved that a mixed result, such as TDR, has a significant and inverse relation with four measures of firm performance, such as ROA, GPM, NPM, and SP, while statistically, there is no relation with ROE. LTDR is only significant with NPM at a 5% level and has an inverse impact on NPM. This study is significant because it examines, in a single investigation, the effects of leverage on various performance metrics. This study is particularly well-weighed because it has many ramifications for potential stakeholders. The study's practical implications will benefit top-level management in strategic management, the government in enacting laws and other regulations, and investors in making investment decisions based on various environmental and factor considerations. A lower leverage ratio, for instance, is a sign of improved performance because managers will strategically plan to keep it low. On the other hand, lower leverage ratios are also advantageous to stockholders because they allow them to invest in companies with lower debt-to-equity ratios and increase their wealth.

From dematerialising race to distorting decoloniality: development-as-imperialism and Hindu supremacy

This article explores how race in international development currently operates globally. It is not simply a discursive legacy of colonialism but also inextricably embedded in contemporary processes of imperialist extraction and accumulation, which the architecture of development both legitimises and extends. The article argues for deeper engagement with Marxist thinkers located in the Global South in contemporary theorisations of race in development. In the context of multiple anti-racist and decolonial movements globally, many mainstream development actors are claiming to engage with questions of racism within their organisations. This is explored through an analysis of several texts produced by the British Overseas Network for Development (Bond), a large network of organisations working on international development in Britain, in response to the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement since 2020. While contradictions within these texts evidently reflect internal contestations over understandings of racism and anti-racism, they ultimately propose the adoption of diversity-based ‘solutions’ to racism and coloniality in development. These are analysed in the context of a long line of initiatives to relegitimise colonialism and development in order to sustain racialised structures of global capital accumulation. The essentialisation inherent in these approaches facilitates the appropriation of notions of decoloniality by forces of Brahmanical Hindu supremacism in India, which are closely tied to racialised and racialising global corporate capital. The second part of the article explores these processes, highlights the synergies between anti-caste and anti-racist thinking about capital and labour, and argues that Hindu supremacism incorporates, is sustained and strengthened by, and in turn feeds global supremacist ideologies.

Factors influencing marine ecological environment governance toward sustainability: a case study of Zhejiang Province

At present, the marine ecological environment is facing enormous pressure from human activities, and there is an urgent need for coordinated governance by multiple entities to ensure that the marine ecological environment can continuously meet the needs of sustainable development. Marine ecological environmental governance plays multiple roles in the sustainable development of the ocean characteristics. Most existing studies have explored this field from the perspective of the government and public, while failing to adequately account for the factors influencing enterprises’ participation in marine ecological environmental governance. This paper is an effort to provide some empirical research on the influencing factors of enterprises’ participation in marine ecological environmental governance. Based on existing literature, empirical research (213 middle managers were surveyed from 68 coastal enterprises in Zhejiang, China), this study extracts eight core factors that influence corporate participation in marine ecosystems and uses the Fuzzy Decision-making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory approach (Fuzzy DEMATEL). Furthermore, experts from Chinese backgrounds elucidated the complex interdependencies among the factors, based on which key influencing factors were identified. The empirical results indicate that government attention and support, legal and regulatory requirements, and cost-benefit accounting have a positive net effect on corporate participation in marine ecosystem management; when these factors are improved, they drive improvements in other factors(Corporate Capital Capability, Corporate Social Responsibility, Government Enforcement and Appraisal, The Attention of Corporate Leaders, Corporate Internal Management System). Additionally, interviews with Chinese business people support the robustness of the findings and suggest that policymakers cannot ignore government enforcement and assessment efforts. Overall, the study findings can help advance corporate participation in marine environmental governance.

Profits over care? An analysis of the relationship between corporate capitalism in the healthcare industry and cancer mortality in the United States

The characteristic features of 21st-century corporate capitalism – monopoly and financialization – are increasingly being recognized by public health scholars as undermining the foundations of human health. While the “vectors” through which this is occurring are well known – poverty, inequality, climate change among others – locating the root cause of this process in the nature and institutions of contemporary capitalism is relatively new. Researchers have been somewhat slow to study the relationship between contemporary capitalism and human health. In this paper, we focus on one of the leading causes of death in the United States; cancer, and empirically estimate the relationship between various measures of financialization and monopoly in the US healthcare system and cancer mortality. The measures we focus on are for the hospital industry, the health insurance industry, and the pharmaceutical industry. Using a fixed effects model with different specifications and control variables, our analysis is at the state level for the years 2012–2019. These variables include data on population demographic controls, social and economic factors, and health behavior and clinical care. We compare Medicaid expansion states with non-Medicaid expansion states to investigate variations in state-level funded health insurance coverage. The results show a statistically significant positive correlation between the HHI index in the individual healthcare market and cancer mortality and the opioid dispensing rate and cancer mortality.

Machine Learning-Based Causality Analysis of Human Resource Practices on Firm Performance

An organization’s human resource management practices are essential for its competitive advantage. This study specifically examined human resource (HR) practices that predict corporate performance (employee turnover and firm sales) based on a backpropagation neural network (BPN)-based causality analysis. This study aims to test how to optimize human resource practices to improve organizational performance. This study elucidated the effect of HR practices and organizational-level factors on predicting employee turnover and firm sales. The BPN-based causality analysis revealed the relative importance of explanatory variables on firm performance. To test the model, it employed the Human Capital Corporate Panel open data on Korean companies’ HR practices and other characteristics. The analysis identifies causal relationships between specific HR practices and firm performance. The results show that compensation-related HR practices are most influential in predicting firm sales and employee turnover. Moreover, training-related HR practices were modest, and talent acquisition and performance management practices had relatively weak effects on the two outcomes. The study provides insights into how human resource practices can be optimized to improve firm performance and enhance organizational effectiveness. The findings of this study contribute to the growing body of research on the use of machine learning in HR management and suggest practical implications for managers’ insights to optimize HR practices.

제조업 MZ세대 조직몰입 변인 간 구조 관계

Objectives The purpose of this study is to analyze the structural relationship between variables related to organizational commitment of the manufacturing MZ generation and to analyze multiple group analysis of informal learning.
 Methods For this study, exploratory factor analysis, reliability analysis, demographic analysis, and correlation were conducted using the SPSS 26.0 statistical analysis program using the Human Capital Corporate Panel (HCCP) HCCPⅡ 3rd (2022) manufacturing worker data. Structural equation model analysis and multple group analysis were conducted using the AMOS 26.0 program.
 Results First, group culture was found to have a statistically significant positive (+) influence on organizational commitment, but task culture was not significant, and organizational trust was found to have a statistically significant positive (+) influence. Second, group culture and task culture each had a significant positive influence on organizational trust, and a partial mediating effect of organizational trust between group culture and organizational commitment, and a full mediating effect between task culture and organizational commitment were found. third, As a result of multiple group analysis based on whether or not to participate in informal learning, the difference between the two groups, ‘participation’ and ‘non-participation’, was confirmed to have a moderating effect between task culture and organizational commitment, and between task culture and organizational trust.
 Conclusions Through the results of this study, measures to strengthen the collective culture of the manufacturing industry, organizational trust, organizational commitment, and informal learning of the MZ generation were proposed.

The modernization of vessels for the river passenger transportation in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia)

The river passenger transportation (hereinafter referred to as RPT) in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) ensures the mobility of the population and maintains its status as a socially significant industry. Further development and improvement of the activities of river passenger transport should be associated, first of all, with its technical and technological modernization. Therefore, the issue of modernization of existing vessels of the RPT in Yakutia remains relevant. In order to update the RPT industry in the republic, it is necessary to develop a republic’s plan for the modernization of the RPT industry with the participation of a wide range of experts, and include them in the national development program for the Far East until 2035. The RPT should be integrated with the gas industry, a promising and successful one of the republic, subject to the transfer of the same economic and managerial issues of carriers from the state to the Russian corporate capital. In return, the RPTs should become new participants in the gas motor fuel market of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia), take an active part in its formation and thereby receive an additional impetus for development on a new high-quality basis – gas fuel (LNG or LPG), and in fact, to enter a new segment for ourselves – the gas industry market. Similar projects are already being implemented in the transport industry, trucks, sea and river cargo transportation, rail transport in the Russian Federation and abroad, the next step is river passenger transportation and this step should be taken in Yakutia.

기업의 교육훈련 투자와 신입근로자의 조기퇴사율 간의 관계

Objectives This study aimed to analyze the relationship between variables at the corporate and employee levels by utilizing data from the Human Capital Corporate Panel Survey II (HCCP II) conducted by the Korean Research Institute for Vocational Education and Training in 2021. In order to do so, the study set the corporate training and development investment has an impact on early resignation rate of new employees, and to confirm whether job skill enhancement and job satisfaction have a partial mediating effect in the process.
 Methods To do this, an analysis was conducted on data obtained from a survey conducted on 854 participants who responded to the 2021 2nd headquarters and employee survey of the Human Capital Corporate Panel (HCCP II) by the Korea Research Institute for Vocational Education and Training. To examine the relationships and distributions among various variables, basic statistical analysis and correlation analysis were conducted using STATA 17 version. Additionally, validity checks were performed during the aggregation process at the organizational level, utilizing Intra-Class Correlation (ICC) and rwg indices. For validation purposes, partial mediation model analysis and significance testing were carried out using the bootstrap analysis method. Corporate training and development investment was assumed as an independent variable, early resignation rate of new employ-ees was assumed as a dependent variable, job skill enhancement and job satisfaction as mediating variables.
 Results According to the analysis, corporate training and development investment had a negative effect on early resignation rate of new employees. Second, the corporate training and development investment was found to have a positive impact on reducing the early resignation rate of new employees through the job skill enhancement. Third, the corporate training and development investment was confirmed to have a positive impact on reducing the early resignation rate of new employees through increased job satisfaction. The results of this study indicate the need for corporate training and development investment to reduce the early resignation rate of new employees. Furthermore, it was observed that as job skill enhancement and job satisfaction of new em-ployees increase through training and development, the early resignation rate decreases.
 Conclusions The results indicating that the corporate training and development investment has a positive impact on reducing the early resignation rate of new employees are significant in confirming the effectiveness and necessity of training and development. New employees can enhance their proficiency in job-related skills through education and training. This improve-ment has a positive impact on the job satisfaction of new employees. Moreover, perceiving the organization's investment in edu-cation and training as an investment in and interest in oneself, new employees may develop an increased desire to stay with the organization. To enhance job skill and job satisfaction among new employees and reduce early resignation rate, companies should consider investing in corporate training and development. Furthermore, the significance lies in verifying and confirming the partial mediating effect of job skill enhancement and job satisfaction between the corporate training and development in-vestment and the reduction of the early resignation rate of new employees. This contribution reveals the detailed process through which the effects of corporate training and development investment in reducing the early resignation rate, particularly by examining whether job skill enhancement and job satisfaction mediate this effect. Moreover, the study contributes academ-ically and practically by highlighting the role of job skill enhancement and job satisfaction as intermediate variables in the process where the effects of the corporate training and development investment are observed.

Napalm’s University: Abolitionist Visions from the Anti-War Movement

Abstract: This essay reflects on the history of napalm and the US anti-war movement to examine the university as both a site of research and development for chemical and biological warfare during the Cold War, as well as a site of abolitionist intervention and struggle. On one hand, napalm represented how war structured the fabric of everyday life in the United States, a condition of total war that overtook institutions of knowledge production within universities, corporations, and laboratories across the nation. On the other hand, napalm was viewed as exceptionally inhumane compared to other tactics of war, prompting movements for outlawing the chemical from military use. This dissonance between organizing against war itself as a perpetual structure of violence and against napalm as an individual technology of war invites consideration of the material stakes of anti-war organizing in an abolitionist vision. As the military–industrial complex only strengthens the entanglements between the university, corporate capitalism, and military expansion, this essay asks: how might we grapple with our place as abolitionist and anti-militarist scholars to interrogate our relationship to knowledge production and the university itself?

Reflection: Corporate Capitalism's Moral Lack

Corporate capitalism changed dramatically in the early 2000s. The 1980s mantra that “greed is good” gave way to corporate vows to prioritize social and environmental values alongside profit. The rise of the “new corporation” purported to answer a question first raised in the nineteenth century: How do we ensure corporations are legally and morally accountable to those their actions impact? By the late nineteenth century, capitalism had become corporate, and the corporation had become capitalist. This created a moral lack in capitalism that inspired the “new capitalism” in the 1920s, the New Deal administrative state, and today's “new corporation.” Understanding its historical antecedents reveals the “new” corporation's limitations and dangers.