Trust is a fundamental aspect of the moral treatment of stakeholders within the organization-stakeholder relationship. Stakeholders trust the organization to return benefit or protections from harm ...commensurate with their contributions or stakes. However, in many situations, the firm holds greater power than the stakeholder and therefore cannot necessarily be trusted to return the aforementioned duty to the stakeholder. Stakeholders must therefore rely on the trustworthiness of the organization to fulfill obligations in accordance to Phillips' principle of fairness (Business Ethics Quarterly 7(1), 1997, 51-66), particularly where low-power stakeholders may not be fully consenting (Van Buren III, Business Ethics Quarterly 11(3), 2001, 481-499). The construct of organizational trustworthiness developed herewith is presented as a possible solution to the problem of unfairness in organizationstakeholder relations. While organizational trustworthiness does not create an ethical obligation where none existed before, stakeholders who lack power wiU likely be treated fairly when organizational trustworthiness is present.
PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to advance a conceptualization of sustainable HRM that builds on scholarship focusing on the pluralistic nature of human resource management. The paper seeks to ...advance the promise of sustainable HRM as an alternative to HRM scholarship that adopts a unitarist frame of reference.Design/methodology/approachThe paper draws on a variety of HRM-related literatures to offer new insights about what a pluralist perspective on sustainable HRM from the perspective of employees would look like and what it would accomplish, and in so doing allow sustainable HRM to become socially sustainable.FindingsTaking a pluralistic perspective is essential for making the concept of sustainable HRM more distinct and robust. Sustainable HRM can offer a challenge to the dominant unitarist perspective on the employment relationship, focusing the attention of researchers on the extent to which employment practices benefit both employers and employees while contributing to social sustainability outside of the employment context.Originality/valueThis paper adds analyses of pluralism and unitarism to the current literature on sustainable HRM while also focusing attention on how sustainable HRM might be more robustly conceptualized and also more normative in its orientation.
Religion has been in general neglected or even seen as a taboo subject in organizational research and management practice. This is a glaring omission in the business and society and business ethics ...literatures. As a source of moral norms and beliefs, religion has historically played a significant role in the vast majority of societies and continues to remain relevant in almost every society. More broadly, expectations for responsible business behavior are informed by regional, national, or indigenous cultures, which in many parts of the world are heavily influenced by religious belief systems and religious institutions. In this essay, we discuss examples of how religion has functioned as a macro social force affecting business and society, discuss some of the key questions and issues related to research in this domain, offer some observations about why religion may be problematic with regard to its effects on business, and conclude by summarizing the articles contained in the special issue.
Relationships between stakeholders and businesses have the potential for conflict and cooperation. Such conflicts arise out of real differences in values and interests. This article explores the ...employment relationship as an emblematic case of business–stakeholder relations in which conflict is inevitable because employers and employees have interests that are at least partially conflicting, even while some degree of collaboration and shared interests underpins the existence of all employment relationships. We build on insights from the philosophy of agonism to develop the concept of agonistic business responsibility, which is a stakeholder management orientation that views conflict and contestation differently from the status quo, which we term antagonistic business irresponsibility. We discuss the broader implications of these ideas for stakeholder relations at the organizational level and the prospect of strengthened institutions at the societal level.
Context:
Evaluating the efficacy of pediatric weight loss treatments is critical.
Objective:
This is the first meta-analysis of the efficacy of RCTs comparing pediatric lifestyle interventions to ...no-treatment or information/education-only controls.
Data Sources:
Medline, PsycINFO, and Cochrane Controlled Trials Register.
Study Selection:
Fourteen RCTs targetting change in weight status were eligible, yielding 19 effect sizes.
Data Extraction:
Standardized coding was used to extract information on design, participant characteristics, interventions, and results.
Data Synthesis:
For trials with no-treatment controls, the mean effect size was 0.75 (
k
= 9, 95% confidence interval CI = 0.52-0.98) at end of treatment and 0.60 (
k
= 4, CI = 0.27-0.94) at follow-up. For trials with information/education-only controls, the mean ES was 0.48 (
k
= 4, CI = 0.13-0.82) at end of treatment and 0.91 (
k
= 2, CI = 0.32-1.50) at follow-up. No moderator effects were identified.
Conclusions:
Lifestyle interventions for pediatric overweight are efficacious in the short term with some evidence for extended persistence. Future research is required to identify moderators and mediators and to determine the optimal length and intensity of treatment required to produce enduring changes in weight status.
Human trafficking is one of the most lucrative international criminal activities and is widespread across a variety of industries. The response to human trafficking in corporate supply chains has ...been dominated by analyses of due diligence obligations. Existing scholarship, however, has cast doubt on the effectiveness of corporate due diligence in addressing human trafficking, because human trafficking is the outcome of macro-level social structures that are created by and consist of multiple actors, including business. The outsourcing and sub-contracting model provides incentives throughout the global supply chain to sub-contract further to reduce the cost of labor, which has led to human trafficking remaining a pervasive problem. Business responsibility for human trafficking derives from the fact that business decisions and strategies enable the conditions that allow for human trafficking to occur within their supply chains. To address human trafficking, we propose a social connection and political responsibility model, based on Iris Marion Young’s analysis of social connection and structural injustice, that is holistic, forward-looking, and outcomes-oriented. We differentiate between businesses with a strong connection to human trafficking and businesses with a weak connection, and within this distinction delineate different pathways that firms can take to meet their political responsibilities to address human trafficking. We conclude with implications for future research.
Entrepreneurship is the dominant form of enterprise in conflict-affected settings, yet little is known about the role of entrepreneurship in peacebuilding. In response, this article undertakes a ...review of entrepreneurship in conflict-affected regions to integrate research from business and management with research from political science, international relations, and parallel domains. Three views of entrepreneurship emerge—the destructive view, economic view, and social cohesion view—showing how entrepreneurship can concurrently create conflict but also potentially generate peace. The article identifies new avenues for pro-peace entrepreneurship: namely, through personal transformation, social contributions, inclusive interactions, conflict trigger removal, intergroup policy persuasion, and acting as legal champions. This article also discusses several pathways forward for business-for-peace research alongside additional implications for the deployment of business-based support programs in conflict settings.
This empirical study examines corporate responses to activist shareholder groups filing social-policy shareholder resolutions. Using resource dependency theory as our conceptual framing, we identify ...some of the drivers of corporate responses to shareholder activists. This study departs from previous studies by including a fourth possible corporate response, engaging in dialogue. Dialogue, an alternative to shareholder resolutions filed by activists, is a process in which corporations and activist shareholder groups mutually agree to engage in ongoing negotiations to deal with social issues. Based on a unique dataset of resolutions filed by member organizations of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility from 2002 to 2005 and the outcomes of these resolutions, our analysis finds that corporate managers are more likely to engage in dialogue with shareholder activists when the firm is larger, is more responsive to stakeholders, the CEO is the board chair, and the firm has a relatively lower percentage of institutional investors.
We introduce the construct of organizational social capital and develop a model of its components and consequences. Organizational social capital is defined as a resource reflecting the character of ...social relations within the organization. It is realized through members' levels of collective goal orientation and shared trust, which create value by facilitating successful collective action. We discuss employment practices as primary mechanisms by which social capital is fostered or discouraged within organizations.
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