Few firm-level empirical studies have been conducted to test whether environmental information disclosure (EID) policy remains effective in pollution control and improving environmental performance. ...We treat the release of the Pollutant Information Transparency Index (PITI) in 2008 as a quasi-natural experiment, using matched data from the Chinese industrial firm database and the Chinese industrial firm pollution database from 2003 to 2012 and adopting the difference-in-differences (DID) method to estimate the emission reduction effect and mechanism of EID on SO2 emissions of firms. The results show that there is a significant emission reduction effect of EID on industrial firms and it still holds after a series of robustness checks. The heterogeneity analysis suggests that EID has a superior pollution emission reduction effect on private firms, large-scale firms and firms in the western region. To gain a more in-depth understanding of how emerging environmental regulations such as EID can affect the pollution emission behavior of firms, we further conduct mechanism tests and find that EID may induce non-compliant firms to reduce emissions by both improving the energy structure of firms and restructuring capital factors. In addition, this study verifies the moderating effect of local government environmental governance in the emission reduction process of EID. Local government can strengthen the enforcement of environmental regulations in order to improve the disclosed information content and send green signals, which in turn promotes firms to reduce emissions. This is conducive to further regularizing the disclosure content of EID and exerting the environmental governance effect of EID. It provides new support for local governments to better use the power of disclosure in the information age to encourage non-compliant firms to control pollution.
•EID has significant emission reduction effect on firms and has heterogeneous effects.•Consider the release of PITI as quasi-natural experiment with DID approach.•Data of Chinese industrial firms in 2002–2013 are used.•EID can reduce firms' emissions by improving the energy structure and restructuring capital factors of firms.•Local government environmental governance has moderating effect.
Previous research has emphasized corporate lobbying as a pathway
through which businesses influence government policy. This article
examines a less-studied mode of influence: private regulation,
...defined as voluntary efforts by firms to restrain their own
behavior. We argue that firms can use modest private regulations as
a political strategy to preempt more stringent public regulations.
To test this hypothesis, we administered experiments to three groups
that demand environmental regulations: voters, activists, and
government officials. Our experiments revealed how each group
responded to voluntary environmental programs (VEPs) by firms.
Relatively modest VEPs dissuaded all three groups from seeking more
draconian government regulations, a finding with important
implications for social welfare. We observed these effects most
strongly when all companies within an industry joined the voluntary
effort. Our study documents an understudied source of corporate
power, while also exposing the limits of private regulation as a
strategy for influencing government policy.
This study seeks to explore the firm-level interconnections in the fast changing and integrating global energy market. We investigate the risk connectedness using a Value-at-Risk (VaR) measure within ...a network composed of the top 20 global energy companies recognized by the Platts global energy company rankings, using the Diebold and Yilmaz's (2014) approach. We manage to identify the top risk contributors to the system across companies, regions and industries, and construct a total systemic risk index (TSRI) of the energy system. We further investigate which risk factors play a role in driving the evolution of the TSRI, again from a network perspective. The results show that its dynamics are mainly driven by the US stock market volatility and investors' sentiment in the financial market over the full sample, while energy market risks and exchange rate movements exert significant but short-term influences.
•The risk connectedness in a network composed of top 20 global energy companies is investigated.•A total systemic risk index (TSRI) of the energy network is constructed.•The US stock market volatility and financial market sentiment are major drivers of the time-varying TSRI.•Energy market risks and exchange rate movements exert significant but short-term influences on the TSRI.
Implementing Industry 4.0 and interconnected robotization in industrial enterprises drifts towards occupational changes. Nowadays, the task is to create cooperation and collaboration between a robot ...and a human in a common robotized workplace so that it is safe and effective. The type of robot, the robotic device that works in collaboration with a human operator, is called a cobot. In the case of a closer interaction of the robot or cobot with humans, it is necessary to consider where it is possible to replace human work entirely or where it is possible to merely supplement it. The most socially acceptable option is the implementation of robots only for the performance of supplementary tasks, since the traditional work positions of people in manufacturing processes would remain largely preserved. On the other hand, workplace robotization is particularly suitable for work environments with hazardous chemical substances that are carcinogenic and toxic to humans. Similarly, robotization helps to improve workplace ergonomics and also to avoid, for humans, very laborious and often repetitive work. The SWOT analysis (analysis of Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) was used as a relevant tool to assess various aspects of the impact of increasing robotization on working positions in industrial enterprises. SWOT analysis is an indicative assessment of the suitability of implementation of robots in a given workplace, which helps to create an optimal solution and indicate new areas of needed analysis and research directions.
Industrial demand response can play an important part in balancing the intermittent production from a growing share of renewable energies in electricity markets. This paper analyses the role of ...aggregators – intermediaries between participants and power markets – in facilitating industrial demand response. Based on the results from semi-structured interviews with German demand response aggregators, as well as a wider stakeholder online survey, we examine the role of aggregators in overcoming barriers to industrial demand response. We find that a central role for aggregators is to raise awareness for the potentials of demand response, as well as to support implementation by engaging key actors in industrial companies. Moreover, we develop a taxonomy that helps analyse how the different functional roles of aggregators create economic value. We find that there is considerable heterogeneity in the kind of services that aggregators offer, many of which do create significant economic value. However, some of the functional roles that aggregators currently fill may become obsolete once market barriers to demand response are reduced or knowledge on demand response becomes more diffused.
•We develop a taxonomy linking aggregator roles to the creation of economic value.•There is considerable heterogeneity in the kind of services that aggregators offer.•Raising awareness for demand response and engaging actors is a key aggregator role.•We find that several barriers named in the literature are not relevant in industry.•Some aggregator roles exist due to regulatory shortcomings and market immaturity.
We present a model that explains how the very cluster dynamics is both the driver for the movement of a cluster through a life cycle and the reason why this movement differs from the industry life ...cycle. The model is based on two key processes: the first is that the emergence, growth, decline and renewal of the cluster depend on the technological heterogeneity of firms; the second is that firms have a larger relative absorptive capacity, when they are in the same location, and thus especially localized learning changes heterogeneity: it leads to a technological convergence when learning takes place within the cluster and technological divergence, when learning takes place outside the cluster, yet in the same region. We derive hypothesis from the model regarding different phases of the cluster life cycle.
In this article for the 40th Anniversary of the Journal of Public Policy & Marketing (JPPM), the authors first share what is meant by “policy,” “public policy,” and “marketing and public policy” for ...researchers in our field. The authors then offer examples of JPPM research informing policy across different stages of the policy-making process: problem identification, agenda setting, policy formulation, budgeting, implementation, and evaluation. They also discuss important sources of public policy (e.g., federal, state, and international agencies; self-regulation; the courts; nonprofits; society; industry standards; company policies; personal ethics) and their role in the marketing and public policy process. The authors then offer JPPM application examples (consumer protection; antitrust/competition; vulnerability; diversity, equity, and inclusion; nutrition labeling; addiction, cannabis, and antidrug research; tobacco warning labeling and education; and privacy and technology) and share ideas for developing research that contributes to the marketing and public policy discipline and in making a positive difference in society and people's lives.
Group Affiliation and Entry Barriers Pattnaik, Chinmay; Lu, Qiang; Gaur, Ajai S.
Journal of business ethics,
12/2018, Volume:
153, Issue:
4
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Business groups dominate the economic landscape in many economies around the world. While business groups overcome the institutional voids arising due to inefficiencies of external markets, they also ...possess market power, which could be economically and socially counterproductive, especially for unaffiliated firms. Drawing on the transaction cost and industrial organization economics, we examine whether the presence of business group affiliated firms in industries restricts the entry of unaffiliated firms or firms affiliated with small- and medium-size business groups. Findings based on Indian firms suggest that investments by business group affiliated firms in an industry have an inverted U-shaped relationship with the investment by unaffiliated firms. However, investments by firms affiliated with large-sized business groups have a U-shaped relationship with the investment by affiliates of small and medium business groups. These findings suggest that the market power of business groups and entry barrier relationship is contingent on the size of the business groups.
Expanding the scale of innovation activity proceeds from companies’ intense interest in retaining and strengthening their market positions. The success of this activity considerably depends on the ...employees’ competencies in creating and introducing innovations. The paper aims to test the method for assessing the level of employees’ innovative behaviour (LEIB) at industrial enterprises. The tenets of personnel and innovation management constitute the methodological basis of the research. The LEIB is determined using the own developed method, which implies the calculation of the composite indicator based on 40 indicators that characterise the innovative behaviour of employees at individual and company levels. Empirical evidence is the data on innovative development of OOO Modern Glass including accounting and management reporting, business plans, forecasts. The tested method proved to be practically sound: the analysis revealed a low level of employees’ innovative behaviour. To adjust the company policy on innovation management, the paper suggests a set of measures including the refinement of the remuneration system; development of the competencies in the field of innovative development; organisation of events to increase awareness about the company’s innovation activity. The forecasts estimate that these measures are to increase the level of employees’ innovative behaviour by 16 %.
PDF
