institutional exceptions on global projects a process model this inductive study offers an examination of 23 cases in which informants from firms engaged in large scale global projects reported unforeseen costs after failing to comprehend cognitive cultural normative and or regulative institutions in an unfamiliar host societal context the study builds on the conceptual framework of institutional theory the findings which include propositions and a generic narrative model contribute to theoretical knowledge of how institutional exceptions arise how they are resolved and how they typically involve three general phases ignorance sensemaking and response the findings also articulate the kinds of institutional transaction costs that an entrant incurs in each of the three phases and the conditions that lead to the growth of these costs

can multinational enterprises light up developing countries evidences from the access to electricity in sub saharan africa summary this paper examines the role that multinational enterprises mnes and foreign direct investments fdi can have in enhancing the access to electricity for local communities in developing countries based on the quality of home and host institutions access to electricity is a marker for development but it is far from being universal in developing countries the shortage of electricity is mainly the consequence of inability of governments in planning financing and developing necessary electricity infrastructure in this context investments from other actors can be essential particularly we focus on the role of fdi and mnes we claim that when mnes invest in developing countries they are incentivized to solve the lack of electricity infrastructure mainly for two reasons to guarantee their business activities and to gain legitimacy with their local stakeholders in addition we argue that mnes and fdi from institutionally underdeveloped countries will be more prone to develop infrastructure for the provision of electricity to local population as generally they suffer from a negative stereotype for this study we rely on 1 547 observations composed of pairs of 83 home countries and 15 host countries in sub saharan africa observed from 2005 to 2011 due to the nature of the database we adopt panel data techniques i e system gmm and corrected least square dummy variable estimators we find that fdi promotes access to electricity in developing countries with weak institutions and this is more likely true when fdi come from institutionally underdeveloped countries these results are far from obvious as they controvert common idea among institutional scholars that a regulatory authority is essential in the provision of infrastructure in conclusion with this paper we partially rehabilitate the image of mnes investing in developing countries by demonstrating that under certain conditions they could contribute to energy poverty alleviation of local population

is corporate aid targeted to poor and deserving countries a case study of nestle s aid allocation summary empirical evidence on the targeting of private aid is largely lacking even though corporate donors are an increasingly important source of aid we contribute to closing this gap by performing a case study of nestle the allocation of nestle s aid is compared to that of swiss oda and ngo aid testing for both altruistic and selfish aid motivations we conclude that nestle s aid clearly lacks focus in terms of targeting poor countries which appears to be the downside of the strong link between commercial presence and aid moreover according to our tobit estimations nestle grants more aid to recipient countries with stronger democratic but also more corrupt institutions

two warehouse partial backlogging inventory models for deteriorating items under inflation abstract in many real life situations the practical experiences reveal that some but not all customers will wait for backlogged items during a shortage period such as for fashionable commodities or high tech products with short product life cycle the longer the waiting time is the smaller the backlogging rate would be according to such phenomenon taking the backlogging rate into account is necessary thus i here extend the models introduced in yang 2004 two warehouse inventory models for deteriorating items with shortages under inflation european journal of operational research 157 2 344 356 to incorporate partial backlogging and then compare the two two warehouse inventory models based on the minimum cost approach the study shows that the optimal solution not only exists but also is unique and model 2 is still less expensive to operate than model 1 if the factors of partial backlogging and inflationary effect are considered finally some numerical examples for illustration are provided and sensitivity analysis on some parameters is made

corporate led sustainable development and energy poverty alleviation at the bottom of the pyramid the case of the cleancook in nigeria summary corporations are increasingly viewed as key actors in poverty alleviation bottom of the pyramid bop advocates suggest that multinational corporations mncs can simultaneously alleviate poverty and make profits by selling scaled down products to the poor our paper investigates this claim using the case of the cleancook stove and fuel technology introduced in nigeria by an mnc working through a nonprofit organization and local business actors supply and demand side analyses show that the cleancook is least likely to reach the energy poor bop households originally targeted the evidence suggests that serving the bop requires greater differentiation than can be achieved with profit driven business models

poverty alleviation as business strategy evaluating commitments of frontrunner multinational corporations summary in the debate on how to combat poverty the positive role of mncs is frequently mentioned nowadays although doubts and criticism remain facing this societal debate mncs feel the pressure to formulate a position this paper analyzes mncs policies on their poverty alleviating potential frontrunner mncs turn out not to be very outspoken especially not on those issues that have the largest potential to help alleviate poverty placed in the context of other mncs behavior a sector coordinated morality seems important which means that a meso approach to poverty alleviation needs to complement the current global macro and individual company micro focus

multinationality and corporate ethics codes of conduct in the sporting goods industry the international operations of firms have substantial impact on the formulation and implementation of business ethical principles such as codes of conduct the international sporting goods industry has been a pioneer in setting up codes and thus provides much relevant experience different sourcing strategies degrees of multinationality and national backgrounds affect the contents of codes moreover international non governmental organizations prove equally effective in triggering sophisticated codes

oil extraction and poverty reduction in the niger delta a critical examination of partnership initiatives the combination of corporate community conflicts and oil transnational corporations tncs rhetoric about being socially responsible has meant that the issue of community development and poverty reduction have recently moved from the periphery to the heart of strategic business thinking within the nigerian oil industry as a result oil tncs have increasingly responded to this challenge by adopting partnership strategies as a means to contribute to poverty reductions in their host communities as well as secure their social licence to operate this paper critically examines the strengths and weaknesses of the different community development partnership cdps initiatives employed by shell exxon mobil and total to contribute to poverty reduction within their host communities in the niger delta nigeria drawing on empirical data and critical analysis the paper argues that while the cdp initiatives by spdc mpn and epnl have the potential to contribute to community development the failure to integrate negative injunction duties into existing partnerships means that the partnerships make no difference to how oil tncs conduct their core business operation consequently cdps have had limited positive impact on poverty reduction in the niger delta the paper concludes by examining the implications of the emerging issues for partnership and poverty reduction

foreign direct investment and income inequality further evidence abstract this paper examines the relationship between foreign direct investment fdi and income inequality special attention has been paid to data comparability and model specification by comparing models with and without geographical dummies this study shows that the statistically significant correlation between fdi and income inequality widely obtained in earlier studies might capture more of the geographical difference in inequality than the deleterious influence of fdi and to the extent that fdi does give rise to more unequal income distribution in the host less developed countries ldcs only east southeast asia ldcs appear to have been harmed by the inflow of fdi during the 1970s it should be noted however that the second result refers only to the marginal impact not the total impact apart from fdi our empirical evidence suggests that the level of economic development the direct role of government and to a smaller degree the significance of the agriculture sector in an ldc are crucial determinants of income inequality

do corporate codes of ethics reflect national character evidence from europe and the united states this paper analyses the usage and contents of corporate codes of ethics the results from a sample of 600 large european companies are contrasted with findings reported for similar u s firms the comparison reveals that significantly fewer european than u s firms adopted codes of ethics in europe the large majority of codes have been introduced only very recently and there are indications that codes made their way into europe via subsidiaries of u s firms however there are striking differences in content between u s and european codes of ethics pointing to the existence of a distinctly european approach to codifying ethics

inventory models with ramp type demand rate partial backlogging and weibull deterioration rate in this paper an inventory model with general ramp type demand rate time dependent weibull deterioration rate and partial backlogging of unsatisfied demand is considered the model is studied under the following different replenishment policies a starting with no shortages and b starting with shortages the model is fairly general as the demand rate up to the time point of its stabilization is a general function of time the backlogging rate is any non increasing function of the waiting time up to the next replenishment the optimal replenishment policy for the model is derived for both the above mentioned policies

the industrial organization of congress or why legislatures like firms are not organized as markets this paper provides a theory of legislative institutions that parallels the theory of the firm and the theory of contractual institutions like market institutions legislative institutions reflect two key components the goals or preferences of individuals here representatives seeking reelection and the relevant transactions costs we present three conclusions first we show how the legislative institutions enforce bargains among legislators second we explain why given the peculiar form of bargaining problems found in legislatures specific forms of nonmarket exchange prove superior to market exchange third our approach shows how the committee system limits the types of coalitions that may form on a particular issue

policy uncertainty and the sequence of entry by japanese firms 1980 1998 we extend the stages model of internationalization to incorporate a sophisticated consideration of temporal and cross national variation in the uncertainty of the policy environment using a sample of 6465 international expansions of 665 japanese manufacturing firms in 49 countries we develop arguments from internationalization and bargaining power perspectives to show how japanese firms manage policy uncertainty in host country environments through the within country sequencing of investments although a distribution to manufacturing entry sequence tends to prevail in countries with low levels of policy uncertainty as uncertainty in the policy environment increases initial entry by distribution is increasingly likely to be eschewed in favor of an initial entry by a joint venture manufacturing plant we suggest that this change in investment sequence occurs as firms shift from an emphasis on developing knowledge about local markets and consumers in low hazards markets to an international expansion strategy in uncertain policy environments that places knowledge development of the policy environment at the forefront of a firm s strategy

corporate social responsibility and different stages of economic development singapore turkey and ethiopia the u s and u k models of corporate social responsibility csr are relatively well defined as the phenomenon of csr establishes itself more globally the question arises as to the nature of csr in other countries is a universal model of csr applicable across countries or is csr specific to country context this article uses integrative social contracts theory isct and four institutional factors firm ownership structure corporate governance openness of the economy to international investment and the role of civil society to examine csr in singapore turkey and ethiopia field research results illustrate variation across the institutional factors and suggest that csr is responsive to country differences research findings have implications for consideration of the tradeoff between global and local csr priorities and practices

corporate social responsibility and corporate governance role of context in international settings this research aims to explore the relationship between corporate governance and csr what are the major factors that play a direct role in the establishment of this relationship how does context and institutional background impact upon the relationship between csr and governance using in depth semi structured interviews from two types of governance systems in three countries over three years this study has demonstrated that in practice within different settings csr is being used both as a strategy as well as a reaction to different drivers we call this adaptive governance where governance can be defined as a flexible system of action incorporating strategic and monitoring activities that determines the way a company enacts its responsibilities to its shareholders and stakeholders and which is determined at any given time by the interrelationship of institutional drivers and behavioural norms governance systems and their interrelationships with csr are demonstrated as fluid according to the national and institutional context economic situation and industry impact in the eyes of practitioners corporate governance includes both structural and behavioural factors as well as responsibilities and actions towards shareholders and stakeholders contextual factors that this research highlights to be important to the incorporation of csr into governance include the economic environment national governance system regulation and soft law shareholders national culture behavioural norms and industry impacts hypotheses on the impact of institutional contexts industry impacts and economic situations on different types of csr actions are proposed for further research

an integrated production inventory model with imperfect production processes and weibull distribution deterioration under inflation abstract this study develops an integrated production and inventory model from the perspectives of both the manufacturer and the retailer the model assumes a varying rate of deterioration partial backordering inflation imperfect production processes and multiple deliveries the elapsed time until the production process shift is assumed to be arbitrarily distributed the discounted cash flow and classical optimization technique are used to derive the optimal solution a numerical example including the sensitivity analysis is given to validate the results of the production inventory model the integrated decision results in lower optimal joint cost compared with an independent decision by the manufacturer and the retailer

multiperiod effects of corporate social responsibility on supply chain networks transaction costs emissions and risk abstract this paper develops a framework for the analysis of the optimal levels of corporate social responsibility csr activities in a multiperiod supply chain network consisting of manufacturers retailers and consumers manufacturers and retailers determine their production quantities transaction quantities and the amount of social responsibility activities they want to pursue that maximize net return minimize emission and minimize risk over the planning horizon we investigate the interplay of the heterogeneous decision makers and compute the equilibrium pattern of product outputs transactions prices and levels of social responsibility activities the paper provides insights concerning the optimal allocation of resources to csr activities when considering a multiperiod time frame

planning for shortages net present value analysis for a deteriorating item with partial backlogging abstract this paper develops inventory models to help answer strategic questions concerning whether planning for shortages offers financial benefits a production inventory system producing a deteriorating product in batches at a finite production rate with partial backordering is considered customers pay a deposit when placing a backorder backordered items receive a discount on the sales price as lost sales may lead to customers not returning the demand rate may depend on the fraction of lost sales we develop a cash flow based profit maximising net present value npv model without the inventory cost parameters commonly used in this context unit holding cost unit backorder cost unit deterioration cost and unit lost sales cost the model finds the optimal inventory policy just like npv models that discount the traditional parameters but has the advantage of not needing to estimate the value of the traditional parameters it is shown that in models based on discounting the traditional parameters the parameters are not exogenously determinable but are non trivial functions of non financial endogenous system parameters such as the production rate annual demand rate and backorder rate extensive numerical experiments illustrate how cash flow npv models provide insights into the value of planning for shortages and strategic choices about the design of the production inventory system it also provides insight into the classical problem of how to interpret unit backorder cost and unit lost sales cost the study indicates that these insights cannot be reliably obtained from npv models based on discounting unit backorder costs and unit lost sales costs

foreign investment and ethics how to contribute to social responsibility by doing business in less developed countries do foreign direct investment fdi and international business ventures promote positive social and economic development in emerging nations this question will always prove contentious first the impacts differ according to context second the social consequences and spillover effects of knowledge diffusion and technology sharing may be limited and hard to measure third contributions to enhancing social responsibility and improving living standards in host countries are delayed in effect causally complex and also hard to measure outcomes often critically depend on collaboration of governments international institutions the business world and non governmental organizations ngos research in this area is challenging and requires interdisciplinary collaboration between economists financial experts sociologists ethicists and other specialists this paper explores 1 the evidence to support the proposition that fdi and international business improve social conditions in less developed countries and 2 how these improvements are linked to strategies of corporate social responsibility csr and ethical business practice the paper draws insights from development fdi poverty alleviation and bottom of the pyramid bop literature applications are demonstrated using examples from poverty stricken areas of sub saharan africa the paper attempts not only to argue theoretically but also to provide practical evidence the approach is simultaneously descriptive analytical and prescriptive in order to address a wide audience it also highlights issues and trends for further academic research and presents the viewpoint that some limitations lie in the nature of ethics frameworks widely referenced in business and that these often fail to consider the compatibility of ethical constructs with relevant incentives in this vein we explore the application of homann s framework for advantage and incentive based ethics

two warehouse partial backlogging inventory models with three parameter weibull distribution deterioration under inflation abstract in many inventory systems the effects of deterioration of physical goods have drawn much attention of various researchers in recent years the more the deterioration is the more the order quantity would be according to such consideration taking the deterioration rate into account is necessary thus in this paper i develop the two warehouse partial backlogging inventory model introduced in yang 2006 to incorporate three parameter weibull deterioration distribution the objective is to derive the optimal replenishment policy that minimizes the net present value of total relevant cost per unit time two alternative models are compared based on the minimum cost approach the study shows that the optimal solution not only exists but also is unique model 2 is still less expensive to operate than model 1 in the proposed model finally some numerical examples and sensitivity analysis on parameters are made to validate the results of the proposed inventory system

an institutional analysis of corporate social responsibility in kenya there is little doubt that corporate social responsibility csr is now a global concept and a prominent feature of international business with its practice localised and differing across countries despite the growing body of research focussing on csr in developing countries there is dearth research on csr institutionalisation in african countries drawing on institutional theory it this article examines the focus and form of csr practice of companies in kenya it is evident from our findings that the nature and orientation of csr differ across companies with operations only in kenya and those headquartered abroad or with international operations significantly firm related drivers such as public relations and performance as well as global institutional pressures explain the focus and form of csr in kenya this article concludes that for the institutionalisation of csr in kenya attention must be paid to conditions that stifle csr uptake such as lack of government regulations and the government s capacity and commitment to enforce regulation the establishment of functional csr institutions and a vibrant civil society that advance civil regulation ought to be encouraged

an epq model of ramp type demand with weibull deterioration under inflation and finite horizon in crisp and fuzzy environment abstract this paper deals with an economic production model for deteriorating items with ramp type demand rate a single item is produced and the finite rate of production is proportional to the demand rate the deterioration rate of the item is taken as two parameter weibull s distribution we also have considered the effect of inflation when there is no shortage in the stock and the model is under finite time horizon the inventory model is solved under crisp and fuzzy environment to evaluate the optimum solution of the model in different cases we illustrate the model with an example by taking various number of replenishment we present sensitivity analysis to illustrate the example under crisp and fuzziness thus the objective of the paper is to find the optimal solution of production time so as to minimize the present value of total cost of the whole replenishment cycle and to check which environment crisp or fuzzy is desirable

experiential knowledge and costs in the internationalization process using a behavioral approach this study identifies and delineates components of experiential knowledge in the internationalization process three hypotheses are developed and tested they center around the lack of knowledge in the areas of foreign business foreign institutions and firm internationalization as well as the effect that this lack of knowledge has on managers perceived cost in the internationalization process with the help of a lisrel based structural model the three hypotheses are tested on a sample of 362 service firms the analysis shows that lack of internationalization knowledge has a strong impact on the lack of both business and institutionalization but there is no direct effect of lack of internationalization knowledge on perceived cost of internationalization

the power of the buckley and casson thesis the ability to manage institutional idiosyncrasies recent patterns of rapid internationalization in sectors characterized by strong public interest and both government and domestic capital constraints seem at first inconsistent with the drivers of internationalization identified by buckley and casson 1976 for manufacturing industries in the postwar era a more microanalytic perspective however identifies the ability to manage institutional idiosyncrasies as a firm level capability akin to research or advertising that can drive internalization across national borders and thereby internationalization these arguments are examined using evidence from the independent power production sector

the influence of the management team s international experience on the internationalization behaviors of smes why are some small and medium sized enterprises smes more successful in selling outside their domestic markets than are other smes in the same industry although the traditional explanation is that firms can gain valuable knowledge and resources as they become older and larger small and young firms are not necessarily disadvantaged if they develop other mechanisms to acquire the requisite knowledge and resources we examine the role of the management team s international experience as such a mechanism for the internationalization of canadian software product firms we show that internationally experienced management teams have a greater propensity to develop foreign strategic partners and to delay less in obtaining foreign sales after start up and that these behaviors are associated with a higher degree of internationalization

convergence versus divergence of csr in developing countries an embedded multi layered institutional lens this paper capitalizes on an institutional perspective to analyze corporate social responsibility csr orientations in the lebanese context specifically the paper compiles a new theoretical framework drawing on a multi level model of institutional flows by scott institutions and organizations ideas and interests 2008 and the explicit implicit csr model by matten and moon acad manag rev 33 2 404 424 2008 this new theoretical framework is then used to explore the csr convergence versus divergence question in a developing country context the findings highlight the usefulness of the compiled multi layered institutional framework and the varied nuances and profound insights it offers in analyzing csr in context they also suggest that a cosmetic level of global convergence in explicit csr may materialize in light of mimetic isomorphic pressures but that the path dependence hypothesis is indeed salient in light of national history trajectories and socio politico configurations the findings correspond most closely to patterns of csr crossvergence combining elements of both convergence and divergence and reflecting in complex hybridized csr expressions the findings and their implications are presented and assessed

an inventory model for deteriorating items with shortages and time varying demand abstract a deterministic inventory system for items with a constant deterioration rate is studied demand varies in time and it is assumed that it follows a power pattern shortages are allowed and backlogged the ordering cost the holding cost the backlogging cost the deteriorating cost and the purchasing cost are considered in the inventory management an approach is proposed to minimize the total cost per inventory cycle this cost depends on two decision variables the time at which the inventory level falls to zero and the length of the scheduling period numerical examples illustrate the theoretical results

the effects of corporate restructuring on aggregate industry specialization it has been widely argued that the purpose of corporate restructuring during the 1980s was to produce a population of more industry specialized competitive firms in response to intensifying global competition a number of studies show that corporate restructuring resulted in increased corporate focus during the 1980s however no study has yet examined whether corporate restructuring resulted in increased specialization at the industry level during the 1980s this study examines this issue first we examine whether or not aggregate industry specialization increased during the 1980s that is we ask did the average firm in any given u s industry become more or less specialized to that industry during the 1980s second we examine whether corporate restructuring was a significant determinant of change in aggregate industry specialization during the 1980s using a sample of 686 four digit sic industries and 64 two digit industry groups this study finds that aggregate industry specialization declined very slightly at both the four digit and two digit level between 1981 and 1989 this study also finds that sell offs of establishments through corporate control transactions or interfirm asset sales had no significant effect on aggregate industry specialization