Corporate Greening Research Articles

Corporate social responsibility and green supply chain efficiency: conditioning effects based on CEO narcissism

Accelerating the construction of the green supply chain system and improving the efficiency of the green supply chain is the key to promoting the high-quality development of enterprises. In view of this, based on stakeholder theory, higher order theory and expectancy theory, this study focuses on the impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) on corporate green supply chain efficiency (GSCE) and the moderating role of chief executive officer (CEO) narcissism. A regression analysis of the observed sample reveals that CSR significantly enhances GSCE. Further decomposing CSR into internal CSR and external CSR to reveal the impact of different types of CSR on GSCE, we find that internal CSR fulfillment has a significant positive impact on GSCE, and this relationship is strengthened when CEOs are narcissistic. Furthermore, external CSR has a significant negative impact on GSCE, and this relationship is also strengthened by CEO narcissism. The main contribution of this paper is to study the relationship between CSR and green supply chain efficiency, decompose CSR into internal and external CSR, enrich the research on the intrinsic mechanism of value creation of CSR. It also enriches the research in the context of CSR from the perspective of CEO personality traits, providing new ideas and suggestions for manager selection and corporate greening governance in practice.

Corporate governance perspective on environmental reporting: Literature review and future research agenda

AbstractThe last three decades have witnessed substantial growth in the literature exploring the motives and drivers of corporate greening. Extant research analyzing the governance determinants of corporate environmental disclosure provides competing and contrasting results; despite the growing sustainability challenges create an urgent need for effective monitoring and incentive mechanisms to promote corporate transparency and accountability. This warrants further inquiry in the field, yet very few comprehensive reviews have been presented on governance determinants of corporate environmental disclosure. To fill this gap we conduct a systematic review of 121 published papers and distinguish the governance mechanisms fostering corporate environmental disclosure. Our paper identifies factors influencing the adoption, extant, and quality of environmental disclosure, and provides useful future research directions.

Gracious growth

Organizations are increasingly turning to sustainable practices. A significant challenge in the endeavour to embrace sustainability relates to the trade-off between corporate greening and corporate growth – i.e., the difficult task of achieving growth while being truly sustainable. Through an in-depth study of Brunello Cucinelli, one of the world’s leading companies in the luxury fashion industry, we introduce the management philosophy of “gracious growth” to help organizations manage the green-growth trade-off and pursue substantial rather than symbolic sustainability. We offer actionable recommendations and present a process framework that organizations can adopt to implement “gracious growth”. Generating new insights about how growth and sustainability can be simultaneously achieved, this article provides ideas that can help managers enhance their organizations’ economic and environmental performance while also avoiding the legitimacy risks associated with greenwashing.

Twitch the Corporate Green Tale - An Empirical Study on the Learning Styles to Enhance Green Supply Chain Practices

<p>With an increasing awareness of environmental impacts, corporates are migrating from traditional supply chain operations to green supply chain operations. In this endeavor of corporate greening, employees’ roles and functions are transformed to become extensions of learning roles to enhance green practices. The employees, through their job roles, are receptive to learning about green supply chain practices in different ways through different learning styles. Understanding which learning style enhances green supply chain practices in the organization will be beneficial to structure appropriate learning interventions. For this study, 12 manufacturing companies were selected based on convenience sampling. In total, 270 respondents were chosen based on disproportionate stratified random sampling from 12 manufacturing companies through questionnaire. Bayesian Linear Regression was performed on the data collected. This empirical study establishes that employees’ learning styles can play a pertinent role in enhancing green practices in organizations. The learning styles drive, support and exploit the full-fledged potential of Green Procurement and Green Manufacturing practices but no significant impact on Green Distribution and Reverse Logistics. The understanding derived from the analysis is depicted as ‘Learn and Act’ Cycle of green supply chain practices.</p>

Does it pay for new firms to be green? An empirical analysis of when and how different greening strategies affect the performance of new firms

Despite the significant attention devoted to the impact of corporate greening strategies on firm performance, research has so far focused on established firms, leaving the situation in new firms unclear. In this study, it is hypothesised that the impact of greening strategies on the performance of new firms depends on the type of strategy, and that the firm's age positively moderates this impact. Using a cross-sectoral dataset of 11,039 new firms from 36 countries, binary and ordinal logistic regressions were estimated for different start-up phases. The results indicate that new firms benefit from substantive greening strategies but, contrary to expectations, not from symbolic greening strategies. The performance of new firms in their later start-up phases was even found to be harmed if they adopt symbolic strategies but do not reinforce them with substantive actions (green-washing). No impact, or only a weakly positive impact was found for firms adopting both substantive and symbolic greening strategies (green-highlighting) or only substantive ones (brown-washing). Furthermore, the interaction analyses did not reveal any moderating effects of firm age, but additional investigation shows that the impacts of greening strategies do differ between age groups. Finally, robustness tests reveal that the relationship between substantive greening strategies and the performance of new firms is not linear but decreases with increasing environmental efforts.

Why do they do it? Corporate venture capital investments in cleantech startups

Sustainable startups commercializing a clean technology provide an opportunity for a greener future. Despite their high investment risks, cleantech startups increasingly attract corporate venture capital. This paper explores which companies invest venture capital in cleantech startups and why they do it. It includes 26 cases of established companies that invested in cleantech startups founded in Norway between 1999 and 2012. This study broadens the scope of corporate venture capital research. The findings show that corporate venture capital investors are more heterogeneous than assumed in the literature thus far. Firstly, it finds that small and medium enterprises are active corporate venture capital investors. Secondly, it reveals that the motivations to invest are more diverse than hitherto assumed. The study adds to the sustainability literature by empirically revealing that large companies invest corporate venture capital to promote corporate greening to maintain competitiveness.

Slow violence and corporate greening in the war on drugs in Colombia

Abstract Next to a broader agrarian reform, the Peace Accord signed between the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC-EP) and the Colombian Government (2016) was designed to support the voluntary substitution of illicit crops in an attempt to fight drug trafficking. In the municipality of Miranda (Northern Cauca), over 1300 peasant families agreed to eradicate their coca crops and stop their work in coca fields as part of the National Comprehensive Program for the Substitution of Illicit Crops (PNIS). Nearly three years later, the programme has shown little progress based on complementary evidence. First, it has only embraced 38% of the families who declared their will to replace illicit crops; and second, it has delayed commitments regarding access to land and financial and technical assistance for alternative projects. Based on extensive ethnographic fieldwork, this article brings an insightful and original political ecology perspective to environmental peacebuilding, showing that the promised transformation for marginalized peasant communities has been neglected. We argue that initial solutions for substitution have not only been redirected to benefit green corporate agrarian projects but have also been gradually abandoned by the state, creating different forms of slow environmental violence.

Introduction: The Climate Issue

Introduction:The Climate Issue Timo Müller (bio) and Michelle Yates (bio) Climate is emerging as the predominant problem of the twenty-first century. The existential threat posed by climate change, which has long been understood in the abstract, is beginning to take concrete shape for more and more people. Released by the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the Sixth Assessment Report (2021) shows that climate change is not only a dire present issue but also now irreversible for the next few hundred to a thousand years. The Sixth Assessment Report also documents an increased certainty that there will be more frequent and more intense severe weather and climate-related extremes. People are already experiencing the effects and "slow violence" of climate change through heat waves, heavy precipitation, sea level rise, wildfires, drought, flooding, tropical cyclones, and the rapid loss of marine fauna. Agriculture and yield production in the United States and around the world are negatively impacted by climate change, and this impact will continue in the future. Climate change threatens lives and livelihoods across the world. These developments have engendered a variety of cultural practices, discourses, and imaginaries that range from targeted demonstrations (e.g., People's Climate March, Extinction Rebellion) and lawsuits (e.g., Juliana v. United States) all the way to influential scenarios of future decline or renewal. These cultural manifestations in turn shape not only our moral, political, and economic responses to climate change but our very understanding of climate itself. As Matthew Schneider-Mayerson (2015) has pointed out, there is a dearth of scholarship within the field of American Studies addressing climate change even though the United States is a main driver of climate change. Schneider-Mayerson [End Page 9] notes that there are no special issues within the field of American Studies dedicated to climate, and that it is only in the past few years that there have been American Studies Association conference panels dedicated to the topic. Since the 2015 publication of Schneider-Mayerson's critique, there has been one special issue on climate in the field, "Cli-Fi and American Studies," edited by Susanne Leikam and Julia Leyda for the journal Amerikastudien/American Studies (2017). As Leikam and Leyda note in their Introduction, the twenty-first century has seen a "remarkable burgeoning of a heterogeneous body of cultural texts, including literature, film, visual arts, and performances, and scientific works that take on the challenge of prompting global audiences to engage emotionally and intellectually with the implications of anthropogenic climate change" (109). They further note that "the conceptual, methodological, and theoretical frameworks of American Studies offer extensive expertise for analyses of the heterogeneous body of cultural texts engaging with anthropogenic climate change" (111). In 2020, American Quarterly published a special issue on "Energy Pasts and Futures in American Studies," edited by Natasha Zaretsky, Michael Zizer, and Julie Sze. Though the special issue has important overlaps with an analysis of climate, it is focused on the also relatively underexplored topic of energy studies. Meanwhile, a variety of social science and humanities journals whose scope partly overlaps with that of American Studies have recognized the importance of engaging with climate. Some have published special issues that include case studies about the United States, for example, Theory, Culture & Society's 2010 special issue on "Changing Climates"; ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment's 2014 special issue on "Global Warming"; and Polygraph's 2020 special issue on "Marxism and Climate Change." Our aim with this special issue of American Studies is to expand the conversation around climate within American Studies, and to push the field toward a more robust dialogue and thorough engagement with all aspects of climate change. One of the things that an American Studies approach to climate can offer is an interdisciplinary perspective that captures the socio-cultural, political, and ontological dimensions of climate change, including experiential forms of knowledge that are frequently overlooked or not captured by scientific and quantitative methods. An American Studies approach can address issues that undergird or even shape such methods, for example, the impact of environmental activism, climate skepticism, or corporate greening strategies on the perception and negotiation of climate change in the...

Is “going green” good to all? Evidence from South Korea

Stakeholders have heterogeneous expectations and demands for corporate environmental responsibility (CER). Going green may cause potential conflicting-interests among stakeholders, because stakeholders who benefit from environmental-management endorse making and implementing environmental-friendly policies. In contrast, stakeholders who bear the costs of a firm’s corporate greening may not support CER initiatives. Firms with differentiated strategic-orientation, which reflect preferences of select stakeholders (controlling families, consumers, and employees), exhibit different perception of and response to CER. Using a panel dataset of South Korean manufacturing firms from 2011 to 2015, this study investigates benefits and costs of CER by exploring relationships among family owned and managed, consumer-oriented, employee-oriented firms, and corporate environmental performance (CEP). Our empirical results show that family owned and managed and employee-oriented firms are less likely to engage in environmentally friendly management. This activity occurs because corporate greening may damage these firms’ interests, such as controlling family shareholders’ private wealth and their employee’s work-life balance.

LEARNING LESSONS FROM CORPORATE GREENING

Today although organizations are growing and registering growth, making huge profits and customer is satisfied but Marketing philosophy has its own limitations. Pollution has contaminated the atmosphere and has restricted our sustainable development. It is observed that in last two decades there is a massive discharge of harmful gases like sulphur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxides (NOx), and hydrocarbon compounds into the atmosphere. Lead pollution has been linked with impaired brain function in children-emissions from vehicles using leaded petrol are a major source. The challenge facing mega cities is how to reduce the adverse environmental impacts and other negative effects of intense pollution due to industries as well as use of transportation by people. Because the dilemma becomes most pressing under conditions of rapid urban. So, with the aim of bringing down the pollution and to minimise its adverse effects, organizations have shifted from marketing orientation to eco-marketing orientation. Studies indicate that during the 1960’s green consumerism emerged and slowly and gradually greener business trends took place world over. Marketing practices and business orientation have started shifting their attention from consumer satisfaction and profitability to consumer satisfaction, profitability & environmental protection. Greening may include developing innovative green product concepts, green concept testing, product development and its marketing, green packaging, paperless communication and green advertising strategies. In this study an attempt is made to study corporate greening practices of selected organisations and how it has helped consumers, organizations and society at large.

The role of sustainable human resource practices in influencing employee behavior for corporate sustainability

AbstractThis article theorizes and empirically tests the relationship between employee perceptions of human resource practices and their propensity to adopt sustainable behavior (SB) to support organizational change for sustainability. Informed by the literature on corporate greening and organizational behaviour, we developed a structural equation model that links frontline employee perceptions of internal sustainability orientation, supervisory support, training and reward systems to their propensity to adopt in‐role and extra‐role SB. Furthermore, we investigated the mediating role of “affective commitment to change” with regard to the relationships between human resource practices and SB. Our results show that when sustainability is valued and promoted by the organization and line managers, employees are more likely to internalize and make sense of sustainability, which is subsequently reflected in a higher commitment to adopt SB. Although we also expected that training and rewards would strengthen commitment and willingness to adopt in‐role and extra‐role SB, rewards appeared to have no effect, and training affected willingness to adopt in‐role sustainable behaviour only when mediated by affective commitment. These results provide scholars of corporate sustainability and managers with evidence‐based insights on how to design HR practices and strategies to enhance employees' commitment and behaviour supporting organizational change for sustainability.

Corporate greening in a large developing economy: pollution prevention strategies

In the backdrop of rapid and continuous deterioration in the quality of air, water and land, pollution prevention strategies have become a critical business issue to the industrial sector throughout the world. The present study aims to explore pollution prevention initiatives and their actual implementation across five different polluting industries from a large developing country’s perspective. Ten sample plants (two from each industry group) were chosen from five different polluting industry groups (iron and steel, cement, pulp and paper, leather and pharmaceuticals) of a large developing economy like India. This study reveals that environmental concerns have increasingly spread among the selected polluting industries. Addressing pollution prevention practices into their business functions these industries have become more responsive to modify production process and improve the quality of the environment. However, there is a huge potential to improve it further.

The influence of carbon emissions disclosure on company financial value in an emerging economy

Few studies have been conducted on the impact of carbon emissions disclosure on firms’ financial performance in emerging economies. Furthermore, comparison between accounting-based measures and market-based ones remains limited. This article examines the effect of carbon emissions reporting on the financial value of South African companies for the period 2010–2015. Using panel regression approaches, the findings show that, in most cases, carbon emission disclosure generates a positive relationship with ROA (an accounting-based indicator) but a negative association with MVA (a market-based indicator). The article concludes that accounting-based indicators offer more explanatory power for corporate greening initiatives.

Erratum to: Linking Corporate Policy and Supervisory Support with Environmental Citizenship Behaviors: The Role of Employee Environmental Beliefs and Commitment

This study investigates the social–psychological mechanisms leading individuals in organizations to engage in environmental citizenship behaviors, which entail keeping abreast of, and participating in, the environmental affairs of a company. Informed by the corporate greening and organizational behavior literature, we suggested that an employee’s level of involvement in the management of a company’s environmental impact was the overt manifestation of his or her discretionary sense of commitment to environmental concerns in the work context, and that such commitment developed through the interplay of individual, organizational, and supervisory factors. Our general findings support the idea that when environmental protection is valued and encouraged by the company and line managers, organization members are more likely to experience a volitional sense of attachment and responsibility to corporate environmental goals and values, which is enacted through citizenship behaviors. We also expected that individual ecological beliefs would strengthen the environmental commitment of employees via identification with, and adherence to, the socially responsible cause embodied by the organization and its managerial staff. But it did not. On the contrary, the data indicated that corporate environmental policy is more likely to influence an employee’s level of environmental commitment when he or she holds weak versus strong personal ecological beliefs. Theoretical and managerial implications of our findings are discussed.

Managers’ Citizenship Behaviors for the Environment: A Developmental Perspective

The objective of this longitudinal study is to analyze the intrinsic drivers and values underlying managers’ organizational citizenship behaviors for the environment (OCBEs) from a developmental psychology perspective based on measuring the stages of consciousness that shape the meaning-making systems of individuals. At time 1, the stages of consciousness of 138 managers were qualitatively assessed using the Leader Development Profile test. At time 2, a quantitative survey measured the environmental beliefs and OCBEs of these managers. The links between stages of consciousness, environmental beliefs, and OCBEs were analyzed using hierarchical regressions. The main findings show that managers’ stages of consciousness positively influence two types of OCBEs, namely eco-initiatives and eco-helping, while environmental beliefs influence eco-helping and eco-civic engagement but do not appear to be connected with the stage of consciousness development. This paper first contributes to the literature on corporate greening by shedding more light on the aspects of behavioral and developmental psychology that underlie environmental leadership. Second, it bridges the gap between theories that have developed separately by showing the interconnectedness between the managers’ stage of consciousness and the more concrete environmental behaviors in the workplace that could have emulative effects throughout the organization.

Internalization of Environmental Practices and Institutional Complexity: Can Stakeholders Pressures Encourage Greenwashing?

This paper analyzes the determinants underlying the internalization of proactive environmental management proposed by certifiable environmental management systems (EMSs) such as those set out in ISO 14001 and the European Management and Auditing Scheme (EMAS). Using a study based on 232 usable questionnaires from EMAS-registered organizations, we explored the influence of institutional pressures from different stakeholders and the role of corporate strategy in the “substantial” versus “symbolic” integration of environmental practices. The results highlighted that although institutional pressures generally strengthen the internalization of proactive environmental practices, the influence of stakeholders can either support the integration of these practices or encourage their superficial adoption. For example, while pressure from suppliers and shareholders contribute to corporate greening, pressure from customers and industrial associations tend to encourage greenwashing (i.e., the superficial and misleading adoption of environmental practices). Product quality-oriented strategies also positively influence EMS internalization. The paper sheds light on the institutional complexity underlying the substantial versus symbolic implementation of environmental practices, and questions the dominant isomorphic view of EMS adoption. The paper also bridges the gap between complementary approaches on corporate greening, notably neo-institutional and stakeholder theories.

The Power of One to Make a Difference: How Informal and Formal CEO Power Affect Environmental Sustainability

We theoretically discuss and empirically show how CEO power based on environmental expertise and formal influence over executives and directors, in the absence and presence of shareholder activism, spurs firms toward greener strategies. Our results support the idea that CEOs with informal power, grounded in expertise, reduce corporate environmental impact and this relationship is amplified when the CEO also enjoys formal power over the board of directors. Additionally, we found that any source of CEO power, whether informal or formal, is a good catalyst for transforming shareholder activism into corporate greening. However, in the absence of such activism, only CEOs’ informal environmental expert power acts as a determinant of firm environmental performance.

Moderating Effect of Institutional Responsiveness on the Relationship Between Green Leadership and Green Competitiveness

With a growing focus among firms globally on saving energy and increasing environmental awareness, it is critical to explore the implementation of corporate greening in subsidiaries of multinational companies. Multinational companies need to respond simultaneously to institutional requirements and pressures for corporate greening. In this study we utilized the natural-resource-based view to investigate how green leadership can enhance green competitiveness. Based on a quantitative analysis of 212 subsidiaries of multinational companies in China, we found that green leadership positively influences green competitiveness. Further, this relationship was found to be stronger in firms with higher (more active) levels of institutional responsiveness. We highlight practical implications and make suggestions for theoretical development.

Corporate strategy and the environment: towards a four-dimensional compatibility model for fostering green management decisions

Purpose– This article aims to draw on the contingency theory to develop a conceptual model of compatibility between corporate environmental responsibility and business strategy that reflects heterogeneity in this relationship. Four dimensions of compatibility are explored: trade-off, ambidexterity, synergy and symbiosis.Design/methodology/approach– The intended contribution is essentially conceptual. A company case study is included to contribute to the development of the four dimensions of compatibility and support the practical relevance of the model. Twelve in-depth interviews with six managers in different functions of the company were conducted. A grounded theory approach was used to identify and express the patterns of compatibility that emerge from the qualitative data and how these patterns are grounded in managers’ meaning-in-use.Findings– The contribution of the compatibility framework is essentially made to the literature on environmental strategy management, evolved from an implicit and, at most, two-dimensional (win–win and win–lose) conceptualisation of the relationship between green and business strategy into an explicit and multi-dimensionally grounded identification of processes and strategic challenges of corporate environmental and social responsibility. The resulting model contributes to a better understanding of corporate greening as a strategic and moral concern to individuals acting on behalf of business organisations and a greater understanding of the linkages between green and business strategies and operations.Originality/value– By clarifying the construct of corporate environmental sustainability and providing useful directions for theory and practice, this research claims to inform green management decision-making. While the compatibility model is not intended to explain all pathways by which firms may elicit contingencies of relevance to environmental and social responsibility, it is suggested that the model paints a more complete and contextualized picture of environmental management mechanisms in business.

The Limitations of Business Case Logic for Societal Benefit & Implications for Corporate Law: A Case Study of Climate Friendlyy Banks

A common refrain within the sustainability literature is that voluntary ‘green’ corporate reforms can benefit a company’s bottom-line even as they serve broader social goals. The question of whether private incentives are aligned with broader socio-environmental benefits has been vigorously debated by advocates, but remains under-examined empirically. This paper provides a qualitative empirical examination of whether and to what extent voluntary corporate greening (and its concomitant social benefit) is driven by business case logic. My analysis focuses on an illustrative but important sector: banking. Specifically, I explore whether private sector banks have the means and motives to facilitate climate change mitigation by supporting low-carbon economic activities in the global economy. I frame my inquiry against the backdrop of theoretical insights from organizational change and management literatures in combination with critical accounting theory and legal and regulatory scholarship. Using interview data obtained from a purposive sample of senior managers within seven early-moving transnational banks and also from non-government organizations and external consultants, I find that business-case-driven corporate change can facilitate societal benefit, but the extent to which it actually does so in practice is extremely limited. Consequently, my analysis underscores the importance of the institutional role played by corporate law and governance norms in influencing socially beneficial corporate behavior. Specifically, I conjecture the potential impacts of directors’ duties in each of the United States, United Kingdom and Australia on ‘climate friendly’ finance sector behavior.