Edwin R. Stafford

Environmental NGO–business collaboration and strategic bridging: a case analysis of the Greenpeace–Foron Alliance

Environmental NGO–business collaborative partnerships, commonly called green alliances, are encouraging corporate enviropreneurship, entrepreneurial innovations that address environmental problems and result in operational efficiencies, new technologies and marketable ‘green’ products. Aside from offering environmental, scientific and legal expertise, environmental NGOs can provide linkages to other societal stakeholders, referred to as strategic bridges, to support enviropreneurial initiatives. This article focuses on the linkage capabilities of environmental NGOs by developing an extended strategic bridging framework that articulates necessary process contingencies and engagement strategies for building effective bridges with environmental stakeholders. Propositions are advanced and tested in an analysis of the alliance between Greenpeace and Foron Household Appliances in Germany during 1992–93 for the marketing of an environmentally responsible refrigerator. Stakeholder characteristics and partnership outcomes reveal managerial implications and conceptual extensions of strategic bridging in green alliances, and future research directions are discussed. Copyright

Partnerships: a path to sustainability

The Seventh International Conference of the Greening of Industry Network (GIN), Partnership and Leadership: Building Alliances for a Sustainable Future, was held in Rome on 15-18 November 1998. This special issue of Business Strategy and the Environment reviews the conferences contributions and discussions by presenting three edited papers1 and this introductory essay. The three papers provide provocative perspectives and research findings on the central meta-themes emerging from the conference concerning collaboration and collaborative leadership for sustainability. This essay summarizes some of the significant issues raised by these and other conference papers as they relate to on-going debates and broader perspectives on sustainability and partnerships emerging in GIN and in the literature. Copyright

Green alliances: building new business with environmental groups

Abstract ‘Green alliances’, partnerships between businesses and environmental groups, can be effective strategies for integrating corporate environmental responsibilities with market goals. They are an outgrowth of an emerging philosophy called ‘Market-based Environmentalism’ which advocates making ecology attractive to businesses via market incentives. This article describes the conceptual underpinnings of the market-based perspective and illustrates how green alliances, specifically, are helping companies to develop ecologically-protective programmes which can lower costs and build differentiation advantages. A typology of green alliances is presented to explain different ways firms can achieve such advantages. Green alliances are a new strategic domain, and some have encountered positioning and relationship management problems. Recommendations are offered on how corporations can successfully ally with environmentalists to push competitive frontiers into the 21st century.

Using co-operative strategies to make alliances work

Abstract Increasingly, firms are engaging in strategic alliances and joint ventures as part of an overall corporate strategy. Partnering is an effective way for firms to develop new technologies and products, procure critical resources, and tap new markets. Many alliances, however, run into problems and fail before ever achieving these benefits. Three key factors establish the foundation of a successful partnership: 1. the co-operative strategy, 2. the relationship, and 3. the partner. Some guidelines are emerging for alliance architects on how to make the right decisions about these pivotal components and on how to evaluate new alliances for the long-term. A well-designed alliance can avert costly and time-consuming repairs later. The key to success is careful planning—not patchwork.

Performing Sustainable Development Through Eco-Collaboration The Ricelands Habitat Partnership

“Performativity” theory offers a useful framework for illuminating the role that organizational discourse plays in engendering new social imaginaries. In this article, the authors demonstrate this point through a genealogy and textual analysis of the Ricelands Habitat Partnership (RHP), an eco-collaboration between the rice industry and environmental advocates in California’s Sacramento Valley. Articulated here as a story of enemies becoming friends, the RHP gives life to a vision of more (if not perfectly) sustainable agriculture, where sustaining business and the natural environment can go hand in hand. The authors argue that sustainable development (like democracy or other abstract concepts) becomes “real” for businesses and for society at large through local enactment. That is, new understandings and practices of sustainability are brought into being and institutionalized through the stories that they generate. Attention to the performative effects of language points to the ethical dimensions of our own research and writing. It suggests the need to consider the potentially world-changing effects of stories that we choose to tell.

Strategic alliances in China: Negotiating the barriers

Abstract Capitalism in China has been evolving rapidly in the form of joint ventures and strategic alliances joining Chinese and Western organizations. Many Westerners developing alliances in China, however, have been frustrated by complexities in the negotiation process, including how to manage cultural differences, overcome language barriers, handle copyrights and work through Chinas complex bureaucracy. In-depth interviews with 29 Western executives experienced with Sino-Western alliances describe some of these challenges and offer some strategies for success.

Environmental collaboration: Potential and limits

Collaborative processes toward sustainability have been receiving increased interest among scholars, policy makers, business practitioners, and other environmental constituents (Hartman et al., 1999). Despite the emergence and acceptance of collaboration within and across a variety of sectors, including government, industry, and the environmental community, little critical research has contributed to our understanding of how effective and appropriate collaboration is as an alternative to traditional ‘command and control,’ protest, or confrontational approaches to environmental protection and sustainability (Harrison, 1999). In a review of collaborative partnerships amongst environmental non-government organisations (NGOs), businesses, and other entities, Murphy and Bendell (1997) claimed: “In most of the partnerships described ... almost no attempt was made to develop systems to evaluate the partnership’s direct contributions to the achievement of environmental goals” (p. 229). In practice, some of the shortcomings resulting from collaboration to address environmental problems have generated harsh criticisms (Currah, 2000).

Greenpeace’s ‘Greenfreeze Campaign’

Motivating industry to adopt environmentally sustainable technologies is a critical challenge. Hart and Milstein (1999) equate the process to that of Joseph Schumpeter’ s (1934) concept of `creative destruction’, defined as revolutionary changes that simultaneously destroy the established economic system from within and create new markets, industries, and organisational relationships. In the environmental arena, leapfrogging over existing unsustainable technologies requires visionary entrepreneurship from `maverick’ firms who potentially can unseat established firms through innovations that create new sustainable technologies, markets, and industrial structure. Creative destruction is inherently threatening to incumbent firms who are likely to resist radical technological changes and act in ways to preserve their market positions and profits.

A new direction for strategic alliance research in marketing: organizational cognition

For marketers and other strategists, the importance of strategic alliances is increasing in both research and practice. Despite frequent considerations of the potential benefits of these interorganizational relationships in both domestic and international markets, alliances have often failed to live up to expectations in practice. Traditional research paradigms have provided few meaningful insights into the causes of success and failure. In this paper, we propose that research using an organizational cognition perspective can provide valuable insights into alliance development and management. We derive important alliance research questions and draw from a wide range of cognitive methodologies to suggest specific directions for future research.

The Paradoxes and Challenges of Creating Social Good Through Environmentalist-Marketer Collaboration

Increasingly, collaborative relationships, commonly called green alliances, are emerging between marketers and environmental groups to promote corporate environmentalism and create social good (Stafford and Hartman 1996). Green alliances allow marketers to obtain ecological expertise, credibility, and linkages to consumers and other relevant stakeholders to support green marketing initiatives (Stafford, Polonsky, and Hartman 2000). Environmental NGOs benefit as well, gaining the opportunity to leverage their efforts directly with business (Stafford and Hartman 2000).