Institutional pressures and corporate environmental management maturity

Abstract

Purpose-This paper examines how corporate environmental management strategies at different environmental management maturity (EMM) stages are influenced by institutional forces in the service sector organizations of a developing country. Design/methodology/approach-We used a multiple case study approach in this study. Institutional isomorphic pressures (coercive, mimetic and normative) at different EMM stages were used as the analytical framework. Findings-The study finds coercive pressures largely shape the corporate environmental management strategies at the reactive stage while mimetic pressures have the greatest influence on the internal integration stage. Combined mimetic and normative pressures influence the environmental strategies at the external integration stage. Further, it emphasizes the importance of various institutional pressures in propelling the organizations in the developing countries to benefit from higher levels of EMM. Originality/value-This paper offers a new theoretical approach that highlights the importance of considering the institutional influence of the top-down process of diffusion and simultaneous counter-process of invention by which the lower level organizational actors shape and change their environmental management practices for corporate EMM.

Eco‐control for corporate sustainable management: A sustainability development stage perspective

“…Further, as the case of Alpha reveals, the sudden ban on glyphosate and other critical agricultural inputs and lifting the ban later once the tea industry suffered a massive loss, show a lack of consistent policies and of institutional support for business organizations, which is a common drawback to the sustainable development agenda of many of the EDEs (Gunarathne & Lee, 2019a).…”

“…The use of eco-controls in any organization is not uniform and depends mainly on the level of sophistication and integration of sustainability management activities pursued by an organization (Gunarathne & Lee, 2019a, 2019bJabbour & Santos, 2006…”

“…With a view to systematizing and classifying corporate sustainability management, many studies provide taxonomic explanations of the development of corporate sustainability management (Jabbour & Santos, 2006;Kolk & Mauser, 2002;Maialle & Jabbour, 2014;Ormazabal et al, 2015;Roome, 1992). All these development perspectives reflect a high level of sustainability management integration into business policy and strategy over time, encompassing a wide range of organizational activities while investing substantial organizational resources (Gunarathne & Lee, 2019a;Kolk & Mauser, 2002).…”

“…Typifying a feature of an organization at the reactive strategy, the information management and decision support of Alpha during this stage were geared to meet the minimum requirements stipulated in the legislation or standards such as Rainforest Alliance (Gunarathne & Lee, 2019a;Jabbour & Santos, 2006;Roome, 1992). The result was the absence of any systematic approach to capturing relevant information and using it in managerial decision making (Gunarathne & Lee, 2019b releases, or web disclosures about the company's (sustainable) agriculture practices were almost nonexistent during this period.…”

Corporate social responsibility leadership for sustainable development: An institutional logics perspective in Brazil

“…However, despite all the progress made to date investigating how corporations have responded to different institutional demands (e.g., Bertels & Lawrence, ; Herold, Farr‐ Wharton, Lee, & Groschopf, ), little research has explored how institutional forces influence company level CSR actions (Cobb, Wry, & Zhao, ; Tolmie, Lehnert, & Zhao, ; Young & Makhija, ) and individual level leadership rationale (Roberts, ). There has also been little exploration of the topic from different perspectives (e.g., Greenwood, Díaz, Li, & Lorente, ; Lane & Devin, ; Thornton, Ocasio, & Lounsbury, ) and in different contexts (Ferreira, Jabbour, & Jabbour, ; Gunarathne & Lee, ), such as the context of developing countries, where the institutional environmental conditions are rather unstable compared with those in developed countries (Dobers & Halme, ; Hayes & Rajao, ; Singh, Pattnaik, Gaur, & Ketencioglu, ).…”