the governance of global value chains unresolved human rights environmental and ethical dilemmas in the apple supply chain the continued advance of global value chains as the mode of production for an increasing number of goods and services has impacted considerably on the economies and societies both of the developed world and the emerging economies although there have been many efforts at reform there is evidence of unresolved dilemmas of human rights environmental issues and ethical dilemmas in the operation of the global value chain this paper focuses on the role and performance of apple inc in the global value chain in asia apple is the most successful corporation on earth measured in financial terms and yet has failed to find a solution to recurrent employment and environmental problems occurring in plants manufacturing apple components this analysis informs the current theoretical debate on the development of the global value chain and the continuing institutional failure that leaves employees vulnerable and the environment neglected

disentangling the college wage premium estimating a model with endogenous education choices this article proposes and empirically implements a structural model of education choices and wage determination to quantitatively evaluate the contributions of productivity enhancement and ability signaling in the college wage premium the model is estimated under various distributional parameterizations using 1990 u s census 5 public use micro sample under these parameterizations i find that college education enhances attendees productivity by about 40 and productivity enhancement accounts for close to two thirds of the college wage premium

authority without credibility competition and conflict between ecolabels in tuna fisheries certification is widely seen as an innovative strategy for dealing with environmental problems in supply chains as the number of labels available in the fisheries sector has increased each with its own framing of sustainability questions are being asked about their credibility in tuna fisheries contrasting approaches have led to conflict over among other things the credibility of competing labels this paper investigates one such conflict between the dolphin safe and the marine stewardship council certification schemes in the west and central pacific it looks at how key practices like scientific rigour inclusiveness transparency openness impartiality independence and impact contribute to label credibility and explains the importance of authority in understanding how certification schemes maintain influence within global production networks the results demonstrate that despite substantially different levels of credibility within these networks the application of an environmental standard is more connected to the authority of the standard setter than the credibility of the label the paper concludes that understanding the more nuanced role of authority both with and without credibility offers new insights into the wider dynamics that shape environmental regulation in global production networks

sustainable development and corporate performance a study based on the dow jones sustainability index the goal of this paper is to examine whether business performance is affected by the adoption of practices included under the term corporate social responsibility csr to achieve this goal we analyse the relation between csr and certain accounting indicators and examine whether there exist significant differences in performance indicators between european firms that have adopted csr and others that have not the effects of compliance with the requirements of csr were determined on the basis of firms included in the dow jones sustainability index djsi and specific accounting indicators were applied to measure performance for the purposes of this study we selected one group of firms belonging to the djsi and another comprised of firms quoted on the dow jones global index djgi but not on the djsi the sample was made up of two groups of 55 firms studied for the period 1998 2004 empirical analysis supports the conclusion that differences in performance exist between firms that belong to the djsi and to the djgi and that these differences are related to csr practices we find that a short term negative impact on performance is produced

management of social issues in supply chains a literature review exploring social issues actions and performance outcomes the social dimension of sustainable development and its impact on supply chains have so far received less attention than the environmental dimension the aim of the research is to explore the intersection between social issues corporate social responsibility csr actions and performance outcomes a structured literature review of social issues in supply chains is presented analysing the research published so far in peer reviewed publications linking csr and supply chain management allows the exploration of strategies and performance outcomes with a focus on social issues the corresponding responsible supply chain actions adopted by firms to address these issues are grouped into communication compliance and supplier development strategies social and economic as well as buyer and supplier performance are identified as the key outcomes but the interactions among these constructs would require further research this paper contributes to the understanding of managing social issues in supply chains by linking social issues responsible supply chain actions and performance outcomes the paper consolidates related research by offering an overarching conceptual framework and points to future research directions and simultaneously provides insights into the management of social issues in supply chains

voluntary governance mechanisms in global supply chains beyond csr to a stakeholder utility perspective poor working conditions remain a serious problem in supplier facilities in developing countries while previous research has explored this from the developed buyers side we examine this phenomenon from the perspective of developing countries suppliers and subcontractors utilizing qualitative data from a major knitwear exporting cluster in india and a stakeholder management lens we develop a framework that shows how the assumptions of conventional buyer driven voluntary governance break down in the dilution of buyer power and in the web of factors rooted in suppliers traditions beliefs local demands and resource dependency we reveal out how success in governing collaborative global supply chains often falls short within the subcontracting stage where a stakeholder management mindset is elusive to most participants we suggest that success in governing collaborative global supply chains is dependent on concepts of stakeholder utility and the presence of shared value that is often at odds with the realities of power information asymmetry and compliance reward systems inherent in the non market coordination of global supply chains our findings offer important insights for delineating the concepts of value creation from csr concepts and practices and for modifying the basic assumptions of conventional supply chain governance

determinants and welfare of the environmental regulatory stringency before and after regulatory capture abstract the enforcement of environmental regulation relies on the willingness and capacity of the regulator the willingness could be disabled by regulatory capture which is widespread and that how many public resources should be invested in environmental regulation is always debatable we develop a 3 stage game to analyze the nonlinear effects and mechanism of regulatory capture and regulatory capacity on environmental regulatory welfare our model suggests that the importance of the regional economy to government the firm size and the customer s disutility on pollution emissions will influence the possibility of regulatory capture furthermore the dynamic research suggests that when the regulatory capture is controlled with the improvement of governmental regulatory capacity the regulator s and customer s welfare continues to grow until the capacity achieves a threshold beyond the threshold the regulatory capacity will be redundant

an empirical test of a cross national model of corporate social responsibility most models of corporate social responsibility revolve around the controversy as to whether business is a single dimensional entity of profit maximization or a multi dimensional entity serving greater societal interests furthermore the models are mostly descriptive in nature and are based on the experiences of western countries there has been little attempt to develop a model that accounts for corporate social responsibility in diverse environments with differing socio cultural and market settings in this paper an attempt has been made to fill this gap by developing a two dimensional model of corporate social responsibility and empirically testing its validity in the context of two dissimilar cultures australia and bangladesh the two dimensions are the span of corporate responsibility narrow to wider perspective and the range of outcomes of social commitments of businesses cost to benefit driven perspective the test results confirm the validity of the two dimensional model in the two environments the factor analysis revealed two leading dimensions cluster analysis pointed to two distinctive clusters of managers in both australia and bangladesh one consisting of managers with a broad contemporary concept of social responsibility and the other with a limited narrow view the paper concludes that corporate social responsibility is two dimensional and universal in nature and that differing cultural and market settings in which managers operate may have little impact on the ethical perceptions of corporate managers

private food standards regulatory gaps and plantation agriculture social and environmental ir responsibility in the philippine export banana industry the expansion of retailer led food production standards over recent years has seen certification against such standards become a de facto condition of access to numerous supply chains globalg a p standards in particular have extended the traditional focus of retailer led standards beyond food safety to include compliance points addressing environmental protection and labour welfare this has stimulated considerable research on the implications of standards compliance for small producers however little attention has been paid either to the relationships between so called private standards and state based regulatory regimes or to the implications of standards compliance for corporate farms their employees and neighbouring communities this paper examines these relationships and implications in the context of plantation banana production in the philippines focussing in particular on gaps that emerge between the ideals of social and environmental responsibility embodied in private standards and actual practices of regulation it finds that while compliance with private standards is associated with comparatively favourable treatment of labour deference to poorly enforced national legislation conceals ongoing human rights and environmental concerns

the economics of smallholder organic contract farming in tropical africa summary the paper examines the revenue effects of certified organic contract farming for smallholders and of adoption of organic agricultural farming methods in a tropical african context the comparison in both cases is with farming systems that are organic by default survey data from a large organic coffee contract farming scheme in uganda are reported and analyzed using a standard ols regression and a full information maximum likelihood fiml estimate of the heckman selection model the analysis finds that controlling for a range of factors there are positive revenue effects both from participation in the scheme and more modestly from applying organic farming techniques

labour chains analysing the role of labour contractors in global production networks abstract third party labour contractors are increasingly prevalent in global production networks gpns and can provide a channel for new forms of unfree labour review of case study evidence from south african and uk horticulture suggests this often emerges off site through labour intermediaries analytical approaches to labour in gpns and value chains are examined the article argues that labour contracting is driven by the commercial dynamics of global outsourcing a cascade system allows unscrupulous intermediaries to coerce vulnerable workers we examine strategies of civil society alliances and regulatory reform and argue for extending liability of all commercial actors across global boundaries

upgrading in global value chains lessons from latin american clusters it has been shown that clustering helps local enterprises in industrial districts overcome growth constraints and compete in distant markets in advanced and less developed countries nevertheless recent contributions have stressed that more attention needs to be paid to external linkages and to the role played by global buyers to foster upgrading at cluster levels in this study we contribute to this debate focusing on the analysis of the relationships existing between clustering global value chains upgrading and sectoral patterns of innovation in latin america we find that sectoral specificities matter and influence the mode and the extent of upgrading in clusters integrated in global value chains

governance pressures and performance outcomes of sustainable supply chain management an empirical analysis of uk manufacturing industry although sustainable supply chain management sscm has recently received increasing attention among uk manufacturing firms there is a concern as to whether sscm practices are being implemented because they are profitable or only because of governance coercive pressure thus the aims of this paper are twofold first determining the role of governance in the adoption of sscm practices second investigating whether sscm practices can be both environmentally beneficial and commercially viable in light of these issues this paper develops and empirically assesses an integrated model of governance pressures sscm practices performance data was collected from 146 uk manufacturing managers and analysed using the structural equation modelling method exogenous driving forces of governance were found to be precursors to the successful implementation of sscm practices the empirical results further suggest that while the implementation of sustainable supply chain management has a positive effect on environmental performance it does not necessarily lead to improved economic performance as only sustainable procurement was found to have a positive effect on economic performance this paper contributes to the literature by highlighting the role of governance in sscm adoption and performance gains in environmental protection while economic performance is partially compromised the results also provide useful insights for both managers seeking to adopt sustainable practices and policy makers seeking to further promote sustainable supply chain

globalisation and unequalisation what can be learned from value chain analysis although many have gained from the process of globalisation there remains a stubbornly large number of people living in absolute poverty and a rise in inequality within and between countries the issue is thus not whether to participate in the global economy but how to do so in a manner which provides for sustainable and equitable income growth this study shows how value chain analysis can be used to chart the growing disjuncture between global economic activity and global income distribution and to provide causal explanations for this outcome in so doing value chain analysis provides valuable insights into policy formulation and implementation

which way is up in upgrading trajectories of change in the value chain for south african wine summary global value chain gvc analysis uses the concept of upgrading to highlight paths for developing country firms to move up the value chain usually through the lenses of four categories product process functional and inter sectoral upgrading the implicit normative expectation is that these firms move toward producing higher value added products and or take on more sophisticated functions along a value chain in this article upgrading is approached more broadly as reaching a better deal including a balance between rewards and risk the case study of south african wine shows that better product quality improved processes and some functional upgrading have co existed with processes of downgrading higher risks and limited rewards especially in traditional export markets a reflection on further conceptual development and directions for empirical research is also provided

e pluribus unum legitimacy issues and multi stakeholder codes of conduct regulatory schema has shifted from government to governance based systems one particular form that has emerged at the international level is the multi stakeholder voluntary code of conduct msvc we argue that such codes are not only simply mechanisms by which various stakeholders attempt to govern the action of the corporation but also systems by which each stakeholder attempts to gain or retain some legitimacy goal each stakeholder is motivated by strategic legitimacy goal to join the code and once a member is also required to assist in maintaining the institutional legitimacy of the code resulting in networked legitimacy we begin our analysis of these systems by first exploring the growth and structure of such msvcs and then building an analytical framework using strategic and institutional legitimacy as they apply to such msvcs we contribute to the codes of conduct literature by developing the construct of networked legitimacy from strategic and institutional legitimacy we then apply our framework to the united nations global compact one of the predominant msvcs today in doing so we 1 demonstrate how different stakeholders are pursuing different types of legitimacy through their participation in the code 2 examine the specific opportunities and risks in terms of what we have called networked legitimacy posed by the institutional design of actual msvcs and 3 create an argument for three pillars supporting the legitimacy of msvcs

estimating a socially optimal water price for irrigation versus an environmentally optimal water price through the use of geographical information systems and social accounting matrices this article develops a method for establishing water prices and their effects in order to provide policy makers an environmentally and socially optimal range of regional prices for irrigation water two prices are determined the environmentally optimal price of water is defined as the one that internalizes the environmental costs generated by agricultural consumption the social optimally price of water is defined as the one that maximizes levies on water for agriculture without affecting the regional economy the environmentally optimal price is calculated with an economic model built over a geographical information system gis that allows the economic quantification and valuation of the environmental cost of water in different basins the optimal price is calculated with a demand curve for irrigation water introduced into a social accounting matrix sam to observe if the regional economy can accept higher prices without affecting the regional gdp potential water prices are established ranging from prices that minimize the negative impact in the regional economy to those that totally internalize the environmental cost of water

respondent experience and contingent valuation of environmental goods abstract respondent experience i e a respondent s information set has long been suspected to influence contingent valuation estimates of environmental values we assess the influence of experience by explicitly modeling the relationship between respondent experience and both fitted individual resource values and the conditional variance of these estimated values using three different joint specifications for experience and wtp normal censored normal poisson censored normal and zero inflated poisson censored normal we find discrete jumps in resource values as experience increases from zero and that more experienced respondents have smaller conditional variances simulation of arbitrary levels of experience allows standardization of the amount of information when developing welfare estimates

the dynamics of fair trade as a mixed form market this article analyses the fair trade sector as a mixed form market i e a market in which different types of players in this case nonprofit co operative and for profit organizations coexist and compete the purposes of this article are 1 to understand the factors that have led fair trade to become a mixed form market and 2 to propose some trails to understand the market dynamics that result from the interactions between the different types of players we start by defining briefly fair trade its different dimensions including the fair quality of the products and its organizational landscape focusing on the distinction between the pioneer alternative trading organizations and the second mover companies then we recall the theoretical emergence factors for each type of organization nonprofit co operative and for profit and apply these emergence factors to the context of fair trade this analysis allows us to capture the specificities of each type of operator with regard to fair trade and thus to have a better understanding of the dynamics in the sector such dynamics includes competition but also conflict and partnership our analysis includes elements on ethical imitation consumers behaviors effects on welfare and the role of the government

focus on fairtrade propositions for integrating fairtrade and supply chain management research driven by increased consumer interest and stakeholder pressure the number of fairtrade ft products has been steadily increasing the mainstreaming of ft means that the products are now facing stiff competition within the generic product categories in which they operate while consumers may pressure organizations for ethical conduct they are less willing to pay premium prices for fairly traded products for ft to continue to grow more efficient operating models are required to offset the premium prices paid to producers to ensure competitiveness in the market one such improvement approach may be the management of ft supply chains to investigate the feasibility of this approach this article systematically combines literature on ft with key supply chain management scm constructs and theories we discuss existing scm paradigms in the context of ft and demonstrate aspects where the efficiency of ft chains needs to be improved to ensure their viability we present propositions that demonstrate the key limitations of the ft model from the point of view of scm theory and practice and suggest the potential changes needed in the management of ft supply chains the article provides a timely first attempt to systematically combine ft with scm constructs thus establishing a basis for the further development of ft chains and for the improvement of the operating efficiency within them

leveraging reputational risk sustainable sourcing campaigns for improving labour standards in production networks ethical or socially sustainable sourcing mechanisms mandating labour standards among the suppliers and subcontractors that organisations source goods and services from are becoming more common the issue of how labour activist groups such as trade unions can encourage organisations to adopt and strengthen these mechanisms within domestic production networks is largely unexplored using three cases of domestic sustainable sourcing campaigns developed by unions in britain the strategies used by labour activists the characteristics of the organisations targeted and the motivations of lead firms for improving sourcing practices are analysed the article makes a significant contribution by demonstrating that organisational susceptibility to reputational risk is a key factor influencing the capacity of activist groups to convince and compel their targets to improve sourcing practices it argues that different types of organisations are susceptible to reputational damage in different ways that risk events provide opportunities for unions to strengthen their leverage against target organisations and that the multidimensional nature of corporate reputation needs to be better considered for understanding how campaigns are framed and executed

challenges to legitimacy at the forest stewardship council the forest stewardship council fsc is a global private governance system overseeing the sustainability and biodiversity of the world forestry system through certification of forests and forestry processes and products and is perceived as the strongest of the various certification schemes available domask globalization and ngos transforming business government and society 2003 gulbrandsen global environmental politics 2004 it has seen more success in developed than developing countries in terms of amount of forest certified and number of chain of custody certificates issued raising questions as to its ability to promote biodiversity gulbrandsen global environmental politics 2004 a number of challenges have risen to the pragmatic and moral legitimacy of the fsc as a global governance system alternative certification schemes output and market access cost of certification plantations and illegal logging i examine each of these challenges as they pertain to the dimensions of pragmatic and moral legitimacy of the fsc i conclude with a discussion of theoretical implications for global governance systems using ecolabel schemes as well as a discussion of practical implications for the fsc in particular

corporate social responsibility theories mapping the territory the corporate social responsibility csr field presents not only a landscape of theories but also a proliferation of approaches which are controversial complex and unclear this article tries to clarify the sit uation mapping the territory by classifying the main csr theories and related approaches in four groups 1 instrumental theories in which the corporation is seen as only an instrument for wealth creation and its social activities are only a means to achieve economic results 2 political theories which concern themselves with the power of corporations in society and a responsible use of this power in the political arena 3 integrative theories in which the corporation is focused on the satisfaction of social demands and 4 ethical theories based on ethical responsibilities of corporations to society in practice each csr theory presents four dimensions related to profits political performance social demands and ethical values the findings suggest the necessity to develop a new theory on the business and society relationship which should integrate these four dimensions

promoting sustainable palm oil viewed from a global networks and flows perspective abstract global demand for palm oil is increasing to fulfil worldwide needs for cooking oil food ingredients biofuels soap and other chemicals in response palm oil production is rapidly expanding which promotes economic growth in producing countries but also leads to serious environmental and social problems such as destruction of tropical forests climate change and threats to small holder livelihoods for these reasons palm oil production and use have become highly controversial however the global character of palm oil production and consumption the number of different actors involved and its multiple uses makes promotion its sustainability highly complex individual nation states can no longer control and regulate a global flow like palm oil and alternative governing networks appear involving private companies and ngos acknowledging the roles of such governance networks with different forms of power means that relying only on economic and political power to explain current dynamics in the palm oil sector is inadequate in global networks like palm oil supply encompassing transnational material flows and multiple actors the relevance of each actor relates to his position in the network power in global palm oil supply is therefore not only related to their position in the vertical supply chains but also to their role in the horizontal networks new forms of power in networks arise from steering the networks programming and from connecting different networks switching in the multiple networks that compose global palm oil provision today different programmers and switchers play critical roles this is briefly illustrated in this paper on the basis of different cases of active steering in global palm oil provision

private eco brands and green market development towards new forms of sustainable governance in food retailing abstract this study seeks to analyze the role of retail eco brands in the development of markets for sustainability certified food products building on insights from the new institutional economics nie paradigm but also broader literature in the supply chain management and marketing research we suggest that private eco branding and third party certification can be explained as private institutional arrangements that motivate and enable sustainability governance by retailers both upstream and downstream in the value chain based on semi structured interviews with western european retailers this study reveals critical functions of retailers sustainability oriented brands these functions address a number of inefficiencies pertained to the third party certification making eco branding a private product policy tool to proactively set and implement sustainability in food production and consumption practices at the same time limitations associated with the development and use of private eco brands are identified based on these limitations we suggest that while retailer s eco brands are likely to play an important role in transforming food markets towards higher levels of sustainability in the future the continuous value of third party certification schemes in implementing sustainability in the food supply chain should not be underestimated the role of the latter will be to reduce transaction costs and liability risks associated with retail efforts to govern product sustainability issues upstream in the supply chain

the evaluation of river water quality improvements by the contingent valuation method the results of an application of the contingent valuation method cvm to the estimation of the recreational benefits which would result from improvements in river water quality are described this

a comparison of two marketable discharge permits systems abstract this paper is an extension of a krupnick w oates and e van de verg j environ econom management10 233 247 1983 their proposed permit system is shown to be formally equivalent to w d montgomery s j econom theory5 395 418 1972 pollution permit system under perfect competition however under noncompetitive assumptions the two systems function differently while montgomery s system may lead to large transaction costs polluters under krupnick et al s pollution offset system can be free riders benefiting from the transactions of others finally some empirical evidence suggests that the pollution offset system may be the most promising but only after several conditions are satisfied

supply chain specific understanding the patchy success of ethical sourcing initiatives as a number of high profile companies have found to their cost corporate reputations can be significantly affected by firms management of sustainability issue including those that are outside their direct control such as the environmental and social impacts of their supply networks this paper begins by examining the relationship between corporate social responsibility reputation and supply network conditions it then looks at the effectiveness of one tool for managing supply network sustainability issues ethical sourcing codes of conduct by examining how the characteristics of three supply networks branded clothes diy wood products and branded confectionary affects the implementation ethical sourcing codes of conduct it ends by setting out conclusions on why implementation of such codes has been so much more successful in some sectors than others and recommendations on effective approaches to managing sustainability issues in supply networks

does firm size comfound the relationship between corporate social performance and firm financial performance there has been some theoretical and empirical debate that the positive relationship between corporate social performance csp and firm financial performance ffp is spurious and in fact caused by a third factor namely large firm size this study examines this question by integrating three meta analyses of more than two decades of research on 1 csp and ffp 2 firm size and csp and 3 firm size and ffp into one path analytic model the present study does not confirm size as a third factor which would confound the relationship between csp and ffp that is even if firm size is controlled for across studies comprising on average over 15 000 observations csp and ffp remain positively correlated showing a true score corrected path coefficient p of 0 37

reliability and predictive validity of contingent values does the nature of the good matter abstract because the contingent valuation mechanism cvm elicits verbal reports of maximum willingness to pay and not actual willingness to pay analysts have expressed doubts about the reliability and validity of contingent values for commodities such as environmental amenities this skepticism is usually attributed to the amorphous nature of the commodity and to peoples lack of familiarity or experience however our comparison of two commodities which lie at polar extremes of the private good public good continuum suggests that the nature of the good may have little influence on the reliability and predictive validity of the cvm instead aspects of the cvm itself e g explicit payment obligation may be more important for high intention behavior consistency

conservative dichotomous choice responses in the active policy setting dc rejections below wtp an important feature of a contingent value cv study is that researchers design a survey that guides respondents to answer dichotomous choice dc questions as if they represent once and for all choices researchers frequently construct hypothetical markets to satisfy this condition yet detractors assert that hypotheticality leads inevitably to inflated dc responses for active policy questions however some respondents may suspect that a cv informs an actual policy issue so to reject a dc might induce the policy maker to reintroduce the policy with a price reduction or a program improvement with potential incentives to deflate a dc response when policies are active we locate two types of respondents that represent two different incentives one class is expected to be able to risk permanent rejection of a waiver from one automobile emissions inspection this class more frequently rejects a dc value known to improve existing conditions another respondent class is expected to be risk averse to defeat of the program or to excessive delay predictably these respondents more frequently accept a dc value that represents a known gain conservative dc responses have implications for the use of cv in active policy contexts opening a role for theory to assist practitioners in these circumstances

a review of sustainable supply chain management practices in canada there is a growing body of research on the theory and practice of sustainable supply chain management sscm however relatively little research has been conducted on the extent to which corporations have integrated sustainability principles into the management of their supply chain and the evaluation of supplier performance the purpose of this article is to explore the extent to which corporate sustainability principles are integrated into supply chain management scm in corporations canada is used as a case study in this article the study included a content analysis of one hundred canadian corporate sustainable development reports and in depth interviews with 18 canadian experts on sscm the article highlights the wide array of ways in which canadian corporations address sscm issues amongst other topics issues associated with supply chain governance standards for sscm collaboration with suppliers performance measurement and accountability within the supply chain are explored the findings reveal that there are many challenges in integrating sustainability into scm these challenges shed light on possible future directions for research in sscm this article underlines the need for research that reflects the interconnected nature of the economic environmental and social dimensions of sustainability particularly as it relates to measuring supplier performance on sustainability initiatives

do codes of conduct improve worker rights in supply chains a study of fair wear foundation the rise of private regulation of sustainability in global production networks has led to intensive debates about the impact of this regulation at the point of production yet few empirical studies have systematically examined this impact in practice based on multiple factory audits of 43 garment factories conducted by the multi stakeholder initiative fair wear foundation we show that codes of conduct improve although marginally worker rights on an overall level but that few significant results are found for specific worker rights our findings also lend support to the widespread argument that codes have uneven impact furthermore we show that even rigorous multi stakeholder factory audits seldom are able to identify process rights violations such as those affecting freedom of association and discrimination and that auditing is thus is more fundamentally flawed than assumed in previous research given companies extensive investments in private regulation of worker rights the findings have important implications for both scholars and managers

toward a new conception of the environment competitiveness relationship accepting a fixed trade off between environmental regulation and competitiveness unnecessarily raises costs and slows down environmental progress studies finding high environmental compliance costs have traditionally focused on static cost impacts ignoring any offsetting productivity benefits from innovation they typically overestimated compliance costs neglected innovation offsets and disregarded the affected industry s initial competitiveness rather than simply adding to cost properly crafted environmental standards can trigger innovation offsets allowing companies to improve their resource productivity shifting the debate from pollution control to pollution prevention was a step forward it is now necessary to make the next step and focus on resource productivity

constructing sustainable palm oil how actors define sustainability abstract biofuels as a renewable source of energy have gained considerable importance in recent years the use of biofuels is expected to rise since national governments of developed nations like the us and european countries see it as one of the ways to fulfill climate targets and increase the security in their energy supply production of biofuels is also expected to rise as developing nations see in biofuels the opportunity for connecting to international markets through supplying a new demand in the energy market several studies report on the environmental social and economic gains and detriments that can arise from increased biofuel production and consumption however research that provides insight into the way in which such issues are defined by actors within the product chain is scarce in this article we analyse how the strategies and value definitions of actors involved in the production and consumption of biofuels lead to specific definitions of sustainability the empirical material concerns the chain of palm oil production in colombia and electricity generation in the netherlands it is analysed using the method of action in context which allows us to uncover the level and source of diversity of sustainability definitions in the product chain while the current growth in production of palm oil is definitely buyer driven the analysis of various activities in the chain shows that several aspects of sustainability are defined in more complex actor fields throughout the product chain

governance of global value chains in response to food safety and certification standards the case of shrimp from vietnam summary we use global value chain gvc theory to understand governance of vietnam s shrimp farming industry we describe this gvc as buyer driven with important food safety standards imposed by governments of importing countries and new certification systems promoted by nongovernmental organizations ngos governance relations are clear between governments in importing countries and vietnam and between importers and ngos governance relations become more fragmented further down the chain where large numbers of small scale producers and traders operate this fragmentation may adversely affect access to the most lucrative markets and have the unanticipated effect of marginalizing small scale farmers and traders

when one size does not fit all a problem of fit rather than failure for voluntary management standards voluntary management standards for social and environmental performance ideally help to define and improve firms related capabilities these standards however have largely failed to improve such performance as intended over emphasis on institutional factors leading to adoption of these standards has neglected the role of firms existing capabilities external pressures can drive firms to adopt standards more than their technical capacity to employ them this can lead to problems of fit between institutional requirements and a firm s existing capabilities we describe a conceptual model that considers the impact of an interaction between a firm s institutional requirements and its existing capabilities on standards failure we suggest solutions that align institutional requirements to appropriate governance forms as a means to improve standards success we contribute to theory by describing the role of firms internal capabilities to the success of voluntary management standards and the reliability of self regulation generally

methodologies and perspectives in research on labour relations in global agricultural production networks a review the integration of global south actors into the global agricultural economy has attracted research on labour effects this is because global south actors are often integrated at the level of produc

swimming upstream local indonesian production networks in globalized palm oil production summary when agricultural commodities in developing countries experience an economic boom they offer potential pathways out of poverty while creating environmental and social problems while recent research provides insights into the governance of international supply chains it provides less analysis of the local production networks creating critical problems indonesia is now the world s largest exporter of crude palm oil this paper analyses processes of oil palm development in three oil palm districts it considers how policy models regime interests and agribusiness strategies shape local production networks generate local outcomes and affect the possibilities of tackling issues associated with this boom

the sa8000 social certification standard literature review and theory based research agenda social accountability 8000 sa8000 was one of the first auditable social standards aimed at promoting labor rights for workers around the world this certification is currently considered the most important in the field of corporate social responsibility csr after approximately 15 years of research on sa8000 we provide the first literature review on this topic we analyze 56 scientific papers that address key issues concerning sa8000 including the advantages of the adoption of the ethical certification and the obstacles to adoption and management and provide a comparison with iso 9001 and iso 14001 standards and with other csr standards and codes of conduct papers are coded following a deductive inductive approach and classified by year of publication publication outlet research focus methodology underpinning theory if any unit of analysis sample size industry and country building on literature findings we identify various research gaps stemming from the scarcity of empirical research and the weakness of theoretical foundations in particular we highlight the lack of evidence on the impact of organizational level factors on the adoption of the standard on the extent of the trade off if any between positive and negative outcomes of sa8000 and the failure to identify moderators of the relation between antecedents and sa8000 adoption and or between adoption and outcomes finally we propose a theory based research agenda on sa8000 for om scholars based on transaction cost economics agency and neo institutional theories and focused on three classes of relevant problems governance structure under sa8000 risk sharing between buyers and suppliers and effects on operational performance

impacts of corporate code of conduct on labor standards a case study of reebok s athletic footwear supplier factory in china this study examines the social impacts of labor related corporate social responsibility csr policies or corporate codes of conduct on upholding labor standards through a case study of csr discourses and codes implementation of reebok a leading branded company enjoying a high profiled image for its human rights achievement in a large taiwanese invested athletic footwear factory located in south china i find although implementation of reebok labor related codes has resulted in a race to ethical and legal minimum labor standards when notoriously inhumane and seriously illegal labor rights abuses were curbed chinese workers were forced to work harder and faster but earned less payment and the employee elected trade union installed through codes implementation operated more like a company union rather than an autonomous workers organization representing worker interests in order to explain the paradoxical effects of reebok labor related codes on labor standards i argue the result is determined by both structural forces and agency related factors embedded in industrial national and local contexts to put it shortly i find the effectiveness of reebok labor related codes is constrained not only by unsolved tension between reebok s impetus for profit maximization and commitment to workers human rights but also by hard nosed competition realities at marketplace and chinese government s insufficient protection of labor rights despite drawing merely from a single case study these findings illuminate key determinants inhibiting the effectiveness of labor related csr policies or codes in upholding labor standards and hence two possible way outs of the deadlock 1 sharing cost for improving labor standards among key players in global supply chain and 2 combining regulatory power of voluntary codes and compulsory state legislations

governance and trade in fresh vegetables the impact of uk supermarkets on the african horticulture industry production of fresh vegetables for export has grown rapidly in a number of countries in sub saharan africa over the last decade this trade brings producers and exporters based in africa together with importers and retailers in europe large retailers in europe play a decisive role in structuring the production and processing of fresh vegetables exported from africa the requirements they specify for cost quality delivery product variety innovation food safety and quality systems help top determine what types of producers and processors are able to gain access to the fresh vegetables chain and the activities they must carry out the control over the fresh vegetables trade exercised by uk supermarkets has clear consequences for inclusion and exclusion of producers and exporters of differing types and for the long term prospects for the fresh vegetables industry in the two major exporting countries studied kenya and zimbabwe

on the deliberative capacity of private multi stakeholder governance the roundtables on responsible soy and sustainable palm oil the democratic quality of private multi stakeholder governance is an important subject of academic and political debate on the one hand private multi stakeholder arrangements are seen as a way of democratizing international environmental governance on the other hand the democratic potential of these arrangements has been heavily criticized and interpreted as a privatization of what should be public to nuance this debate this paper assesses the democratic potential of one specific type of arrangement roundtables these roundtables are presented as being based on a deliberative democratic rationale this paper therefore assesses the deliberative capacity of the roundtables on responsible soy and sustainable palm oil and shows to what extent the communicative processes in these roundtables are inclusive consequential and authentic this paper concludes that the roundtable model tends to fall short on two criteria of deliberative democracy inclusiveness of actors and discourses and consequentiality

using contingent valuation to value environmental improvements alternative methods available to economists for valuing non market goods are outlined contingent valuation is then used to value a ban on straw burning

transparency and value chain sustainability the rise of transparency on the public and political agendas is not an accident or fad soon to be replaced by another timely topic in sustainability politics and governance transparency will remain a key topic in global value chains and will further develop as it piggy backs on wider social developments such as globalization the information age and the shifting role of states in environmental governance transparency in value chains is bound up with positive connotations the more transparency the better it is for the sustainability of chains and for the empowerment of consumers and civil society but an overall positive past assessment of value chain transparency does not automatically extend into the future as new challenges lie ahead this paper investigates the new challenges for value chain transparency and their consequences due to the growing importance attached to transparency in value chains it becomes a central object of power struggles with uncertain outcomes markets and states seek to capture transparency arrangements for their own goals which may not be in line with the assumed normative linkages between value chain transparency and increased power for consumers and civil society in that sense transparency is losing its innocence more transparency is no longer always the best for citizen consumer empowerment and for the sustainability of value chains but value chain secrecy is not an attractive alternative this opens a new research agenda on how transparency should be organized and arranged in value chains to live up to the promises of democracy and sustainability

the taste for leisure career choice and the returns to education abstract we develop a simple methodology to estimate the returns to education despite heterogeneous labor leisure preferences the labor supply behavior of doctors and physician assistants is consistent with people choosing between the two careers based on differing tastes for leisure

greener than thou the political economy of fish ecolabeling and its local manifestations in south africa summary developing country governments and industries have been reluctant to support ecolabels fearing their potentially protectionist effects this reluctance has been countered by international organizations such as fao and ecolabel initiatives with assurances of transparency non discrimination and technical assistance the analysis of the marine stewardship council msc label shows that developing country fisheries and small scale ones in particular have been marginalized furthermore the msc certification of the hake industry in south africa illustrates that ecolabeling is sought in the context of competitive pressures and specific political economies not simply on the basis of value free science and systemic management this article concludes that developing country producers need dedicated systems of standards and verification procedures not only special flexibilities

sustainability governance of chains and networks a review and future outlook this paper reviews the extent to which sustainability governance has been integrated into the literature on sustainable chains and networks the analysis brings together four main approaches to chains and network studies supply chain management scm global commodity chains gcc global value chains gvcs and global production networks gpns to examine how and the extent to which sustainability and sustainability governance are conceptualised and incorporated into their analytical frameworks the results point to a shift in this combined literature from conceptualising the formation of global chains and networks as sites of inequality under conditions of globalisation towards a renewed vision on the potential of chains as a site for social and environmental reform overall however we conclude that the literature on global chains and networks has not adequately conceptualised distinct modes of sustainability governance in response we offer an amended typology for identifying how firm and non firm actors govern sustainability in chains of chains and through chains in globalised commodity production and consumption the paper finishes with an exploration of the research frontiers challenges and continuing potential of chain and network studies to understand the governance of sustainability and a call for further academic debate on the kinds of integrated governance arrangements necessary for future sustainability reform through hybridised public private economic practice

moving beyond commitments creating durable change through the implementation of asia pulp and paper s forest conservation policy abstract campaigns by non governmental organizations ngos pressuring companies to adopt sustainability standards have caught academic interest in recent years critics of this approach toward increasing biodiversity protection and social justice argue that campaign successes are often short lived while proponents emphasize the potential of ngo campaigns to achieve positive environmental and social change in the absence of governmental legislation focusing on the recent forest conservation policy of asia pulp and paper app a leading pulp and paper company operating in southeast asia we analyze the challenges companies face in implementing sustainability commitments made as a result of ngo and market pressure drawing from research on policy implementation and corporate greening we identify key activities to help entrench app s commitments in the company s operations furthermore we suggest that a range of actions by different stakeholder groups can achieve broader effects of app s commitments toward better environmental and social stewardship in the region s pulp and paper sector

united nations global compact the promise performance gap the united nations global compact ungc was created in 2000 to leverage un prestige and induce corporations to embrace 10 principles incorporating values of environmental sustainability protection of human rights fair treatment of workers and elimination of bribery and corruption we review and analyze the gc s activities and impact in enhancing corporate social responsibility since inception first we propose an analytical framework which allows us to assess the qualities of the ungc and its principles in the context of external and internal elements that influence code effectiveness and implementation second we analyze ungc performance in encouraging companies to become signatory members and bring about demonstrable change in corporate csr sustainability activities in its 10 year report ungc has proclaimed growth in both membership and program activity however all credible and publicly available data and documentation conclusively demonstrate that the ungc has failed to induce its signatory companies to enhance their csr efforts and integrate the 10 principles in their policies and operations the result has been a loss of public trust and support of ungc from important constituencies among civil society organizations and those individuals and groups adversely impacted by corporate activities and resultant negative externalities this diminished credibility has also made ungc largely dependent on the corporate sector for its very survival we conclude that this dependence has in turn impaired and would continue to hinder ungc s ability to fulfill its mission such an outcome raises serious questions as to the viability usefulness and continued existence of ungc

globalization and ngos transforming business government and society journal of international business studies 2004 35 564 566 doi 10 1057 palgrave jibs 8400114 it is both easy and hard to define something by what it is not ngos by their title are non governmental organizations in other words all organizations that are not governments that is the easy definition the problem is that ngos by this definition include everything but the proverbial kitchen sink that is private firms religious and charitable organizations universities advocacy groups newspapers and other media and so on doh and teegen s book globalization and ngos transforming business government and society is designed to reduce this open endedness by focusing on what ngos are rather than what they are not the book has three cross cutting themes what are ngos how and why they differ from governments and firms and how they operate in the global economy fit within societies and influence other organizations there are 10 chapters in the book which explore the rise of ngos and their impacts on governments and firms several nice case studies are included global climate change world wildlife fund genetically modified organisms trade policy and forestry the conclusions chapter sums up and provides a research agenda jone pearce in her forward to the book defines ngos as the name given to those nonprofit associations focused on social change via political influence or to those providing social and humanitarian services in highly politicized cross national contexts p xi doh and teegen in their conclusion chapter define ngos as organizations of individuals and donors committed to the promotion of a particular set of issue s through advocacy work and or through operational activities whereby services are delivered pp 206 207 ngos are seen as one of three key actors in the global economy together with governments and firms ngos not only have their own dyadic relationships with the other two actors but also mediate and moderate the business government dyad doh and teegen argue that ngos are agents for change in the global economy therefore scholars and practitioners need to focus more on understanding which ngos matter how firms and governments should best engage ngos and how ngos can play a more definitive role on supranational issues that the public and private sectors have failed to address journal of international business studies 2004 35 564 566 2004 palgrave macmillan ltd all rights reserved 0047 2506 30 00

trade offs in supply chain transparency the case of nudie jeans co though transparency is increasingly central to corporate sustainability and sustainable supply chains the scholarly conversation about supply chain transparency is limited as it defines supply chain transparency inconsistently and lacks an empirical basis we address these shortcomings by developing a multidimensional definition of supply chain transparency and studying the swedish garment retailer nudie jeans attempt to become the most transparent company in the world we extend the scholarly conversation by analyzing how a company in practice attempts to work with supply chain transparency and how to explain the transparency outcomes of such attempts we argue that three underlying tradeoffs i e threat vs collaboration standardization vs differentiation and means vs ends shape a firm s transparency outcomes we question whether more supply chain transparency is always desirable and argue that managers must choose between a compliance or cooperation approach to supply chain transparency

the social performance and distributional consequences of contract farming an equilibrium analysis of the arachide de bouche program in senegal abstract this paper is an empirical analysis of the impact of a contract farming program in senegal we examine the access of poorer community members to contracts and the effect of the program on the income of participants the program performs very well on both counts participants and nonparticipants are indistinguishable by wealth measures and farmers increase their income substantially by participating in the program we attribute the former to the program s mobilization of local information through its use of village intermediaries permitting the substitution of social collateral for physical collateral and making the program more accessible to the poor

an examination of the utility bearing characteristics of occupations a factor analytical approach abstract this paper examines the utility bearing characteristics intrinsic to occupations and their effect on wages a factor analysis finds that occupational characteristics can be summarized by a fewer number of underlying factors this research identifies four factors which significantly influence wages

environmental cleanliness as a public good welfare and policy implications of nonconvex preferences abstract this paper explores the implications of a form of nonconvexity in individual preferences over the public good cleanliness the implications of this nonconvexity on equilibrium outcomes welfare analysis the process of development and optimal government policy are examined the nonconvexity can imply a role for government in providing a commitment to a clean environment even if the government has a cost disadvantage in cleaning compared with individuals by providing a credible commitment to a clean environment the government can induce private individuals to undertake optimal levels of cleaning on their own

evolution of sustainability in supply chain management a literature review abstract an ever increasing demand for products and their consumption has put pressure on industrial output and their supply chains and that demand has resulted in negative impacts on the environment and society increasing rates of pollution and environmental calamities caused by industrial production have urged several researchers and industry experts to work on sustainable production and consumption issues within the context of sustainable supply chain management sscm this paper comprehensively covers the exponential growth of the topic through an evolutionary lens this article attempts to understand the evolution of sustainability issues by analysing trends across industries economies and through the use of various methodologies a comprehensive thematic analysis was performed on 1068 filtered articles from 2000 to 2015 highlighting the development and importance of the body of knowledge the study proposes a conceptual framework to classify various factors along the triple bottom line pillars of sustainability issues in the context of supply chains an in depth study is conducted on 190 articles covering all pillars of sustainability as per the proposed conceptual framework on sscm we observe that studies focusing on all three dimensions of sustainability are comparatively scarce more focus on industry specific studies is required because problems addressing industries that are serious polluters especially those in emerging economies remains largely unaddressed it is observed that the studies addressing social issues are scarce and more focus is required on the measurement of social impacts along the supply chain finally we propose future avenues to extend research on the sscm domain while keeping in mind the need to address industry specific and economy specific problems from the triple bottom line perspective

further tests of entreaties to avoid hypothetical bias in referendum contingent valuation abstract over estimation of willingness to pay in contingent markets has been attributed largely to hypothetical bias one promising approach for avoiding hypothetical bias is to tell respondents enough about such bias that they self correct for it a script designed for this purpose by cummings and taylor was used in hypothetical referenda that differed in payment amount in comparisons with behavior observed in otherwise identical real payment referenda the script worked remarkably well at higher payment levels dropping the likelihood of a yes vote to the level obtained in separate sample real referenda but less well at a lower payment level the repeated success of the script at higher payment amounts is a clear sign that additional research is warranted research that will bring us a more complete understanding of how the entreaty works this research may need to explore its workings at the individual respondent level

the theory of the firm as governance structure from choice to contract the propositions that organization matters and that it is susceptible to analysis were long greeted by skepticism by economists one reason why this message took a long time to register is that it is much easier to say that organization matters than it is to show how and why the prevalence of the science of choice approach to economics has also been an obstacle as developed herein the lessons of organization theory for economics are both different and more consequential when examined through the lens of contract this paper examines economic organization from a science of contract perspective with special emphasis on the theory of the firm

comparison of private incentive mechanisms for improving sustainability of filipino tuna fisheries this paper analyzes the influence of three private incentive mechanisms over decision making related to improved sustainability of fishing practices in filipino tuna fisheries the three mechanisms compared are the world wildlife fund for nature s fishery improvement project model marine stewardship council certification and the international seafood sustainability foundation pro active vessel register the main question addressed in this paper is how and to what extent the private incentive mechanisms support the development of fisher capabilities to respond to the requirements set out by these mechanisms applying a global value chain approach to analyze results collected from key actors involved in philippine tuna fishers contributing to both domestic and regional economic development in the western pacific we explore the structure and function of these private incentive mechanisms in achieving both environmental and economic development outcomes our results show that these private incentive mechanisms deliver different direct and indirect incentives for changing to more sustainable fishing practices and that the success of these mechanisms is dependent on the extent to which the mechanisms support the development of target fisher capabilities to comply with their sustainability requirements we conclude that the future success of these incentive mechanisms depends for a large part on stricter sustainability requirements but also on the capacity of the mechanisms to incentivize the inclusion of more developing country fishers these findings contribute to a wider understanding of how the capabilities of developing country producers are influenced by their relationship with chain and non chain actors and with the wide institutional arrangements that the producers operate in

what do twins studies reveal about the economic returns to education a comparison of australian and us findings conventional estimates of rates of return to education are constrained because they are unable to isolate the returns to schooling from the contribution of individual ability and the influence of family background potentially studies using a sample of twins may overcome these problems monozygotic twins are genetically identical and if they have been reared together share the same family background differences in income between identical twins can therefore be associated with differences in the amount of education they have undertaken in order to estimate the independent influence of education comparisons of such estimates with estimates made from a sample of dizygotic twins who are genetically similar but not identical and who are also reared together may permit evaluation of the biases associated with ability and family background in conventional estimates of the return to education in an important paper jere behrman et al 1977 analyzed data from a sample of male world war ii veteran twins and found that of the overall rate of return to schooling of 8 percent 2 7 percentage points could be attributed to schooling per se 3 2 percentage points could be attributed to genetic factors and 2 1 percentage points could be attributed to shared family environment in a recent paper however orley ashenfelter and alan krueger 1994 have estimated the economic returns to education using data on a new sample of twins which permitted them to adjust their estimate for omitted ability variables and measurement error on this basis they find that family and genetic effects make virtually no contribution to the returns to schooling measurement error however biases the estimated return to schooling downward the findings of ashenfelter and krueger 1994 are very different from previous work in this field and there is now some confusion as to what analysis of twins data really reveals about the economic returns to schooling ashenfelter and krueger s results are based on analysis of data for a sample of 298 individuals 149 pairs of identical twins who attended a twins festival in 1991 they remark at the end of their paper only additional data collection is likely to lead to better estimates of the returns to schooling p 1171

sustainable supply chain management when focal firms are complex a network perspective the purpose of the paper is to generate an understanding of the prerequisites for sustainable supply chain management a common tendency in the literature is to see sustainable supply chain management as something that is undertaken by a focal firm at the end of the chain even though many scholars point to the need for cooperative approaches focal firms are still considered to manage supply chains from one fixed and coherent vantage point the managerial outlook of the focal firm itself understood as a structurally coherent top down controlled unit through an illustration from the swedish retail sector we argue that such a vantage point is problematic we suggest a deeper analysis of focal firms and sustainable supply chain management in terms of a network perspective employed mainly in the industrial marketing and purchasing imp literature the adopted network perspective recognizes both internal and external complexity of sustainable supply chain management implying for example difficulties to control entire organizations and the existence of multiple supply chains to manage it is also suggested that sustainable supply networks may be a viable concept to use when dealing with sustainability issues related to production since it relates sustainability in the supply chain to the more general responsibility context of firms

consistency between contingent valuation estimates a comparison of two studies of uk national parks bateman i willis k and garrod g 1994 consistency between contingent valuation estimates a comparison of two studies of uk national parks reg studies 28 457 474 recent years have seen a significant increase in the application of the contingent valuation method to the evaluation of environmental preferences in the uk recent theoretical and methodological developments suggest that this increase is likely to be sustained for the foreseeable future this paper examines the issue of consistency across studies carried out to date in the uk attention is initially focused upon two major studies which allow the comparison of a number of findings analysis is then extended to a large number of smaller studies these comparisons suggest that the results obtained to date are both consistent and logically ordered with reference to the environmental good and the change in provision under consideration across studies bateman i willis k et garrod g 1994 la coherence des estimations contingentes une

sustainable and responsible supply chain governance challenges and opportunities this paper introduces the special volume on sustainable and responsible supply chain governance as globalized supply chains cross multiple regulatory borders the firms involved in these chains come under increasing pressure from consumers ngos and governments to accept responsibility for social and environmental matters beyond their immediate organizational boundaries governance arrangements for global supply chains are therefore increasingly faced with sustainability requirements of production and consumption our primary objectives for this introductory paper are to explore the governance challenges that globalized supply chains and networks face in becoming sustainable and responsible and thence to identify opportunities for promoting sustainable and responsible governance in doing so we draw on 16 articles published in this special volume of the journal of cleaner production as well as upon the broader sustainable supply chain governance literature we argue that the border crossing nature of global supply chains comes with six major challenges or gaps in sustainability governance and that firms and others attempt to address these using a range of tools including eco labels codes of conduct auditing procedures product information systems procurement guidelines and eco branding however these tools are not sufficient by themselves to bridge the geographical informational communication compliance power and legitimacy gaps that challenge sustainable global chains what else is required the articles in this special volume suggest that coalition and institution building on a broader scale is essential through for example the development of inclusive multi stakeholder coalitions flexibility to adapt global governance arrangements to local social and ecological contexts of production and consumption supplementing effective monitoring and enforcement mechanisms with education and other programs to build compliance capacity and integration of reflexive learning to improve governance arrangements over time

estimating the benefits of low flow alleviation in rivers the case of the ticino river in switzerland 60 of electricity is produced by hydropower plants the construction and operation of these plants determine some negative environmental externalities such as diminishing groundwater levels and spring flows and a reduction in river flow which can severely curtail recreational and fishing activities this study concentrates on an ex ante appraisal of the monetary benefits resulting from an enhancement of river flow for recreational fishing purposes a comparison of estimates of these benefits to the corresponding costs in terms of loss of electricity production incurred by hydropower plants to alleviate low flows may be useful for policy makers for this analysis as suggested by layman et al land economics 72 pp 113 128 1996 the travel cost method tcm is extended to estimate the economic value of recreational fishing in the ticino river the most important river of the canton ticino under existing and hypothetical river flow conditions anglers were asked to state how the nu

evaluating the validity of the dichotomous choice question format in contingent valuation hypothetical and actual cash willingness to pay wtp for an art print were elicited with dichotomous choice and open ended question formats comparing hypothetical and actual dichotomous choice responses using both a likelihood ratio test and the method of convolutions suggests we reject equality at the 0 05 but not the 0 01 level hypothetical wtp was roughly two times actual wtp with the dichotomous choice format there were no significant differences between the open ended and dichotomous choice question formats when both were used to estimate hypothetical wtp or both used to estimate actual wtp

an inquiry into quasi credit contracts the role of reciprocal credit and interlinked deals in small scale fishing communities in agrarian village societies beset with many hazards and uncertainties people evolve various means of coping with risk what is perhaps less known is that credit transactions can sometimes serve the function of reducing risk in such societies this article is concerned with examining several insurance motivated credit arrangements in small scale fishing communities a hunger insurance mechanism of reciprocal credit and a system of interlinked contracts aimed at insuring against risks in the spheres of labour and marketing relations will be extensively dealt with moreover the concept of triadic relationships will be shown to have special relevance in the case of traditional insurance arrangements aiming at controlling problems of moral hazard

in the market but not of it fair trade coffee and forest stewardship council certification as market based social change summary this paper discusses two well known market based social change initiatives fair trade coffee and forest stewardship council certification which harness market forces to pursue social and environmental objectives a serious challenge for both is to operate in the conventional market without undermining their original objectives a global commodity chain analysis approach is combined with insights from economic sociology embeddedness theory to explore the social cultural and organizational factors shaping the initiatives governance structures both initiatives are seen to move along opposite organizational trajectories but face similar pressures from conventional market logics practices and dominant actors a preliminary framework is proposed for comparative assessment focusing on distribution of benefits how conventional market institutions may be questioned and how internal governance manages diverse stakeholder interests and influence

who governs socially oriented voluntary sustainability standards not the producers of certified products summary voluntary sustainability standards setting organizations vsssos create standards to improve the social and or environmental impacts of globalized production networks vsssos are often assumed to have multi stakeholder governance structures that include the producers of certified products e g farmers artisans and workers this article argues that including producers in governance is desirable however analysis of 33 vsssos constitutions shows two thirds do not even imply intention to include producers at most 25 ensure producers have votes seats and 18 give producers veto power the discussion examines what is lost when vsssos do not bring traditionally marginalized voices to global economic governance

conflict minerals and supply chain due diligence an exploratory study of multi tier supply chains as recently stakeholders complain about the use of conflict minerals in consumer products that are often invisible to them in final products firms across industries implement conflict mineral management practices conflict minerals are those whose systemic exploitation and trade contribute to human right violations in the country of extraction and surrounding areas particularly supply chain managers in the western world are challenged taking reasonable steps to identify and prevent risks associated with these resources due to the globally dispersed nature of supply chains and the opacity of the origin of commodities supply chain due diligence scdd represents a holistic concept to proactively manage supply chains reducing the likelihood of the use of conflict minerals effectively based on an exploratory study with 27 semi structured interviews within five european industries we provide insights into patterns of implementation key motivational factors barriers and enablers and impacts of scdd in mineral supply chains our results contribute to both theory and practice as we provide first insights to scdd practices and make recommendations for an industry wide implementation of scdd altogether this study provides the basis for future theory testing research in the context of scdd and conflict mineral management

how does environmental corporate social responsibility matter in a dysfunctional institutional environment evidence from china drawing on institutional and signaling theories this study examines how environmental corporate social responsibility ecsr affects firm performance in a dysfunctional institutional environment we extend the ecsr literature by suggesting that ecsr indirectly influences firm performance through the mediating effects of business and political legitimacy based on a dataset of 238 firms in china we find that ecsr affects business and political legitimacy followed by firm performance moreover legal incompleteness weakens and legal inefficiency strengthens the effects of ecsr on business and political legitimacy

quota induced discarding in heterogeneous fisheries abstract individual quota iq programs are a promising and increasingly common means of regulating fisheries this paper examines how profit maximizing fishers respond to different types of iq programs in fisheries where many types of fish are harvested simultaneously this analysis shows that the most common types of individual quota programs can induce discarding and that individual quota programs that regulate the value of harvests never induce discarding since discarded fish have a high mortality rate value based individual quota programs are superior to their more conventional counterparts in that they waste fewer fish the disadvantages of value based quotas are also examined results are driven by the fact that the harvest technology examined here does not satisfy a free disposal assumption since this free disposal assumption is ubiquitous in production theory and not obviously true the framework developed herein may be useful for analyzing a broad class of problems involving joint production

the emergence of southern standards in agricultural value chains a new trend in sustainability governance abstract the objective of this paper is to understand and trace the emergence of southern standards in global agricultural value chains while the trend towards private standards established by developed country or northern actors has received significant attention in the literature recently an emergent counter trend can be observed which manifests in the development of standards by southern producer country actors this may be attributed to the perceived lack of legitimacy of global standards especially from a southern perspective the paper therefore applies a legitimacy perspective to analyse the emergence of new southern standards in indonesian and malaysian palm oil brazilian soy and south african fruit production the analysis reveals that southern standards both target different audiences to obtain legitimacy and rely on different sources of legitimacy as compared to established northern standards this is done explicitly in order to create cognitive and moral distance to northern standards and ultimately to reclaim the issue areas occupied by northern standards the paper discusses and reflects on the implications of the emergence of southern standards for sustainability governance and concludes with the identification of future research opportunities on southern standards

assessment of leading apparel specialty retailers csr practices as communicated on corporate websites problems and opportunities despite the increased attention to corporate social responsibility csr and regulatory changes in recent years little is known about how apparel companies are implementing and communicating csr practices to their stakeholders to fill the gap this study investigated the range and strategies of leading apparel specialty retailers csr practices as communicated on their websites over a longitudinal period of 1 year in total 17 apparel specialty retailers were included in the analysis the companies websites were content analyzed in depth using the coding criteria focusing on labor and environmental issues developed for this study the initial data were collected in november 2011 and the study was replicated in december 2012 to examine any changes in the csr practices as of 2011 only nine companies addressed csr issues on their websites at different degrees despite their leadership positions in the industry environmental issues were addressed by only five companies with different ranges of practices in 2012 all 17 companies addressed labor issues on their websites with varying degrees of specificity in terms of environmental issues six companies an increase of one company from 2011 addressed environmental initiatives on their websites with wider ranges of practices discussed are problems and opportunities as well as the role of the government and stakeholders for the effective communications of csr policies and initiatives for the apparel industry

the contribution of environmental and social standards towards ensuring legitimacy in supply chain governance increasingly companies implement social and environmental standards as instruments towards corporate social responsibility csr in supply chains this is based on the assumption that such standards increase legitimacy among stakeholders yet a wide variety of standards with different requirement levels exist and companies might tend to introduce the ones with low exigencies using them as a legitimacy front this strategy jeopardizes the reputation of social and environmental standards among stakeholders and their long term trust in these instruments of csr meaning that all expenses for their implementation are of no avail for the companies therefore this paper highlights which criteria are important for the selection implementation and improvement in order to achieve a company s aim but also to strengthen the legitimacy of social and environmental standards this research is based on conceptual thought and some existing empirical research comparing four different social and environmental standards revealing weaknesses and strengths it exposes the basic conditions for the success of such standards among stakeholders and identifies the need for more empirical data

learning from global buyers an increasing number of developing countries engage in contract manufacturing for a decreasing number of global buyers this constellation characterises many labour intensive export sectors the positioning of developing country enterprises in such buyer driven chains is central to research concerned with identifying the winners and losers from globalisation this study contributes to this debate by seeking answers to two questions first what can researchers learn from global buyers about the relative strengths and weaknesses of developing country producers second what can these producers learn from global buyers and what circumstances facilitate or constrain such learning

embedding csr values the global footwear industry s evolving governance structure many transnational corporations and international organizations have embraced corporate social responsibility csr to address criticisms of working and environmental conditions at subcontractors factories while csr codes of conduct are easy to draft supplier compliance has been elusive even third party monitoring has proven an incomplete solution this article proposes that an alteration in the supply chain s governance from an arms length market model to a collaborative partnership often will be necessary to effectuate csr the market model forces contractors to focus on price and delivery as they compete for the lead firm s business rendering csr observance secondary at best a collaborative partnership where the lead firm gives select suppliers secure product orders and other benefits removes disincentives and adds incentives for csr compliance in time the suppliers csr habit should shift their business philosophy toward pursuing csr as an end in itself regardless of buyer incentives and monitoring this article examines these hypotheses in the context of the athletic footwear sector with nike inc and its suppliers as the specific case study the data collected and conclusions reached offer strategies for advancing csr beyond the superficial and often ineffectual code of conduct stage