The impact of voluntary environmental protection instruments on company environmental performance

In the last decade there has been increasing emphasis on the use of voluntary environmental protection tools such as corporate environmental reporting (CER) and environmental management systems (EMSs). There has been relatively little research, however, on the impact of these tools on the actual environmental performance of companies. This paper presents the findings of a survey of 40 companies operating in Western Australia to determine the extent to which the implementation of two voluntary instruments has influenced company environmental performance. The research considered four questions: To what extent have CER and EMSs influenced the environmental performance of companies operating in Western Australia? What are the characteristics of these influences? How does the influence of EMSs on environmental performance compare to that of CER? Have other external factors concurrently influenced environmental performance? In general, most respondents indicated that EMSs had influenced environmental management practices to some extent. On the other hand, CER was seen more as a public relations exercise and had less impact on company practices compared with EMSs. Other factors that influenced environmental performance included pressure from clients, senior management, the public and regulators; corporate culture; and cost savings

Securities Regulation: Opportunities exist for IIROC to regulate responsively

This article examines the applicability of responsive regulation within an inter-agency framework in the financial sector. To do so, the article uses the self-regulatory organization that is responsible for governing Canada’s investment dealers and brokerage firms—the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada (IIROC)—as a prototype example to illustrate how responsive regulation may be encouraged within an inter-agency framework. While the theory aspires to general applicability, particular consideration is given to its ability to govern multiple agencies. In particular, the article pays attention to jurisdictional boundaries to ensure that inter-agency relationships have some legitimacy in market regulation

Smart Privatization: Lessons from Private Sector Involvement in Australian and Canadian Building Regulatory Enforcement Regimes

Various scholars stress that traditional regulatory regimes will benefit from greater private sector involvement. There has been little empirical study, however, on the impact of the "amount" of privatization on certain policy goals. This paper aims at filling that knowledge gap. Based on an analysis of private sector involvement in the enforcement of Australian and Canadian building codes, it argues that a certain threshold exists after which more privatization no longer results in effectiveness and efficiency gains. It furthermore discovers that the relationship between the public and private sector within a regime matters in reaching certain policy goals

Mom, Dad It’s Only a Game! Perceived Gambling and Gaming Behaviors among Adolescents and Young Adults: an Exploratory Study

Gambling and gaming are increasingly popular activities among adolescents. Although gambling is illegal in Portugal for youth under the age of 18 years, gambling opportunities are growing, mainly due to similarity between gambling and other technology-based games. Given the relationship between gambling and gaming activities, the paucity of research on gambling and gaming behaviors in Portugal, and the potential negative consequences in the lives of young people, the goal of this study was to explore and compare the perceptions of these two behaviors between Portuguese adolescents and young adults. Results from six focus groups (three with adolescents and three with young adults, comprising 37 participants aged between 13 and 26 years) indicated different perceptions for the two age groups. For adolescents, gaming was associated with addiction whereas for young adults it was perceived a tool for increasing personal and social skills. With regard to gambling, adolescents associated it with luck and financial rewards, whereas young adults perceived it as an activity with more risks than benefits. These results suggest developmental differences that have implications for intervention programs and future research

Responsive Regulation: Achieving the Right Balance Between Persuasion and Penalisation

This paper not only considers the regulatory challenges faced by regulators, but also the potential of responsive regulation and particularly meta regulation to address these challenges. It explores developments which have necessitated a change from the traditional form of regulation, that is, command and control regulation to more responsive hybrids of regulation. Even though traditional regulation has its advantages, its inability to address the demands of changing business environments has resulted in the adoption of more flexible forms of regulation such as risk based regulation and responsive regulation. Whilst the potential of responsive regulation is considered, the complexities and challenges faced by the regulator in identifying and assessing risk, solutions aimed at countering problems of risk regulation, along with the problems arising from different perceptions of risk will be addressed only briefly.Self regulation; co regulation; enforced self regulation; meta regulation; responsive regulation; risk

A ‘criminal personas’ approach to countering criminal creativity

This paper describes a pilot study of a ‘criminal personas’ approach to countering criminal creativity. The value of the personas approach has been assessed by comparing the identification of criminal opportunity, through ‘traditional’ brainstorming and then through ‘criminal personas’ brainstorming The method involved brainstorm sessions with Computer Forensics Practitioners and with Product Designers, where they were required to generate criminal scenarios, select the most serious criminal opportunities, and propose means of countering them. The findings indicated that there was merit in further research in the development and application of the ‘criminal personas’ approach. The generation of criminal opportunity ideas and proposal of counter criminal solutions were both greater when the brainstorm approach involved the group responding through their given criminal personas