Managing social risk through stakeholder partnership building : empirical descriptive process analysis of stakeholder partnerships from British Petroleum in Colombia and Hoechst in Germany for the management of social risk

This thesis sets out to provide a systematic study of stakeholder partnership building of BP in Colombia and Hoechst in Germany in the context of social risk management. Each company built an NGO and a community partnership that became an integral part of firms' strategy. In examining and evaluating the two companies and the four stakeholder partnerships, the leading research question of how firms build stakeholder partnerships is answered. The present study seeks to identify the characteristics of stakeholder partnership building, as well as to isolate the similarities and differences of this process. Additionally, it is an attempt to define the features of the firms' social risk navigation as context of this research project. The thesis is divided into four parts. The first part introduces the research phenomenon, reviews conceptual foundations, and elaborates methodological issues. The case studies of BP and Hoechst are subdivided into internal processes of social integration and reintegration with regard to the two companies, and external processes of partnership building with regard to the four stakeholder partnerships that are chronologically presented in part two. Part three conceptualises stakeholder partnership building in terms of navigating social risk and partnership alchemy. Finally, part four comprises the research synopsis and reflection. Business and society, stakeholder theory, and strategic relationships are the theoretical areas that contributed to the framework for analysing partnership building. Two longitudinal in-depth case studies provide qualitative data for the processual analysis. The empirical data are categorised, aggregated and compared, in order to extract research findings. The contribution of this research is the extension of behavioural stakeholder theory. It develops is a stakeholder partnership building theory that comprises three parts. First, the 4-Ps of stakeholder partnership building are identified. Second, variables are isolated that describe these elements of partnership alchemy. Finally, four patterns of stakeholder partnership building are identified. As a result, the research presents four propositions for partnership building. Based on the analysis of firms' navigation of social risk, a fifth proposition distinguishes between firm-specific and partnership-specific partnership building. The empirical data provides a contribution to knowledge in its own right by providing detailed insight into the practice of social risk management through stakeholder partnership building

Corporate responsibility, supply chain partnership and performance: An empirical examination

This is the post-print version of the final paper published in International Journal of Production Economics. The published article is available from the link below. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. Copyright @ 2012 Elsevier B.V.Unlike corporate and business levels, there is little research examining corporate responsibility (CR) at the functional level of the firm including supply chain strategy. The results of a firm-level survey show that CR internal awareness, and monitoring CR performance are positively related to the supply chain partnership approach, however sharing CR best practices is negatively associated. Furthermore, the impact of CR on firm performance is mediated by the functional behaviour of supply chain partnership formation. Our study provides support for including CR awareness building and monitoring in the development of partnerships but cautions against imposing CR best practices on suppliers

Stakeholder Theory and Marketing: Moving from a Firm-Centric to a Societal Perspective

This essay is inspired by the ideas and research examined in the special section on “Stakeholder Marketing” of the Journal of Public Policy & Marketing in 2010. The authors argue that stakeholder marketing is slowly coalescing with the broader thinking that has occurred in the stakeholder management and ethics literature streams during the past quarter century. However, the predominant view of stakeholders that many marketers advocate is still primarily pragmatic and company centric. The position advanced herein is that stronger forms of stakeholder marketing that reflect more normative, macro/societal, and network-focused orientations are necessary. The authors briefly explain and justify these characteristics in the context of the growing “prosociety” and “proenvironment” perspectives—orientations that are also in keeping with the public policy focus of this journal. Under the “hard form” of stakeholder theory, which the authors endorse, marketing managers must realize that serving stakeholders sometimes requires sacrificing maximum profits to mitigate outcomes that would inflict major damage on other stakeholders, especially society

The Governance of Corporate Responses to Climate Change: An International Comparison

In response to pressures from governments, investors, non-governmental organisations and other stakeholders, many large corporations have adopted a variety of carbon and energy management practices, taken action to reduce their emissions and set targets to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Using the case of international retailers, this article examines whether, and under what conditions, non-state actors might be capable of assuming the governance roles that have historically been played by national governments. This article concludes that external governance pressures can, if they are aligned, robust and of sufficient duration, have a significant influence on internal governance processes and on corporate strategies and actions. However, the specific actions that are taken by companies – in particular those that require significant capital investments – are constrained by the ‘business case’. That is, companies will generally only invest capital in situations when there is a clear financial case (i.e. where the benefits outweigh the costs, when the rate of return meets or exceeds company targets) for action. That is, the extent to which external governance pressures can force companies to take action, in particular challenging or transformative actions that go beyond the boundaries of the business case, is not at all clear. This is particularly the case if the business case weakens, or if the opportunities for incremental change are exhausted. In that context, the power of non-state actors to force them to consider radical changes in their business processes and their use of energy therefore seems to be very limited

The Importance of Ethics in Branding: Mediating Effects of Ethical Branding on Company Reputation and Brand Loyalty

This study aims to develop an ethical branding framework that determines whether a corporate brand’s functional and emotional values, that is, product, service quality and perceived price (antecedents), influence ethical branding, and, consequently, company reputation and brand loyalty (consequences) among industrial buyers of electronic office equipment in Malaysia. Using structural equation modelling, the paper demonstrates the effects of perceived price, quality of product and service on ethical branding, company reputation and brand loyalty. The results reveal that product quality directly influences ethical brand perceptions, and, consequently, company reputation. Perceived price and service quality do not directly affect company reputation; instead, they affect its identification through ethical branding. The findings thus demonstrate that product quality, perceived price, and service quality affect company reputation through the mediation of ethical branding. This highlights that an ethical brand is effective for companies to maintain their reputation among industrial buyers

Corporate social responsibility: an empirical investigation of U.S. organizations

Organizations that believe they should give something back to the society have embraced the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Although the theoretical underpinnings of CSR have been frequently debated, empirical studies often involve only limited aspects, implying that theory may not be congruent with actual practices and may impede understanding and further development of CSR. The authors investigate actual CSR practices related to five different stakeholder groups, develop an instrument to measure those CSR practices, and apply it to a survey of 401 U.S. organizations. Four different clusters of organizations emerge, depending on the CSR practice focus. The distinctive features of each cluster relate to organizational demographics, perceived influence of stakeholders, managers perceptions of the influence of CSR on performance, and organizational performance

Gestão e práticas socialmente responsáveis na cooperação agrícola

Through its history, agricultural cooperation has developed standards and values, leading specific decision making processes. The article proposes a model of decision based on "dialectical tension". By taking into account the dynamic relationship between stakeholders and organizations, this innovative model overcomes the limits of the stakeholders’ theory

Stakeholder communication in 140 characters or less: a study of community sport foundations

Community sport foundations (CSFs), like other non-profit organizations, are increasingly employing social media such as Twitter to communicate their mission and activities to their diverse stakeholder groups. However, the way these CSFs utilize social media for communicating such practices remains unclear. Through a mixed-method approach of content analysis of tweets from 22 CSFs established by English professional football clubs and interviews with key individuals within these CSFs (n = 7), this study examines the extent to which CSFs’ core activities are being communicated through Twitter and identifies the strategies employed for doing so. Reflecting the target audiences CSFs are seeking to reach through Twitter and the challenges associated with communication about projects involving marginalized groups, tweets largely concern programs related to sports participation and education. The most frequently employed communication strategy is to inform, rather than interact or engage with stakeholders. However, CSFs with higher organizational capacity attempt to go beyond mere informing towards engaging with stakeholder groups that relate to their social agenda, highlighting the importance of trained and dedicated social media personnel in optimizing CSFs’ use of Twitter for communication