Irene Henriques

The Relationship Between Environmental Commitment and Managerial Perceptions of Stakeholder Importance

Do firms committed to stewardship of the natural environment differ from less environmentally committed firms in their perceptions of the relative importance of different stakeholders in influencing their environmental practices? Using cluster analysis on six responses to questions describing a firms practices, we classified 400 firms into four environmental profiles: reactive, defensive, accommodative, and proactive. Results indicate that firms with more proactive profiles do differ from less environmentally committed firms in their perceptions of the relative importance of different stakeholders.

Strategic Investment with Asymmetric Spillovers

This paper investigates the implications of asymmetric spillovers on noncooperative strategic investments in a duopoly with quadratic pay-offs. A unique equilibrium in the announcement of the leader/follower role exists in the case where one firm absorbs large spillovers while the other, at most, is able to receive only small spillovers. The leader in this equilibrium is the firm that absorbs the large spillovers. Other asymmetries in initial costs or efficiency in research and development do not affect this outcome.

Multifactor risk and the stock returns of Canadian paper and forest products companies

Abstract This paper uses a multifactor market model to estimate the expected returns to Canadian paper and forest products stock prices. Results are presented to show that market returns, exchange rates and commodity prices each have large and significant effects on stock price returns in the Canadian paper and forest products industry. In particular, an increase in the market or commodity price factor increases the return to Canadian paper and forest products stock prices while an increase in exchange rates decreases the return to Canadian paper and forest products stock prices. Furthermore, the paper and forest products sector is riskier than the market and its moves are pro-cyclical.

The Returns to University Schooling in Canada

This Paper Presents Evidence on the Monetary Returns, Gross an Net of Taxes, of University Schooling in Canada and on the Private and Social Costs of That Type of Schooling. These Returns Are Obtained by Computing the Future Earnings of Males From Quebec and Ontario Aged 18 in 1981 and Faced with the Choice of Either Attending University of Working. Our Results Show That University Schooling Has a Private Rate of Return of 9 to 16 % and a Public Rate of Return of 7 to 10 %.

'Cleantech' Venture Capital Around the World

Cleantech venture capital investment differs from the typical venture capital investment in that it tends to be very capital intensive and faces greater technology risks associated with the functioning of the technology, scalability and exit requirements than the typical venture capital investment. Moreover, unlike the typical venture capital investment, the benefits arising from cleantech cannot be totally captured by the venture capitalist as many of its benefits accrue to society via reduced environmental degradation and better health and quality of life outcomes. The public goods literature posits that such externalities reduce investment in cleantech below the socially optimal level. We seek to determine whether there are countervailing factors which may incite greater cleantech investment. We argue that oil prices, increased stakeholder attention, as well as the impact of various formal and informal institutions are such factors. This paper provides a cross-country analysis of the determinants of cleantech venture capital investment with a unique worldwide dataset of 31 countries spanning 1996–2010. The data show consistent evidence of a pronounced role for oil prices in driving cleantech venture capital deals, which is more important than other economic, legal or institutional variables. Cleantech media coverage is likewise a statistically significant determinant of cleantech venture capital investment and as economically significant as other country level legal, governance, and cultural variables. Uncertainty avoidance has a negative impact on cleantech venture capital investment, as well as a moderating effect on other variables.

What Constitutes a Theoretical Contribution in the Business and Society Field

No one likes receiving rejection letters. These letters often state that the “manuscript does not show sufficient evidence of a theoretical contribution”—or something to that effect. At Business & Society, our editorial team writes such letters with considerable regularity, both for empirical and conceptual manuscripts.1 Although we usually try to explain to authors why their paper does not meet the required standards for a theoretical contribution, we thought it would be helpful to distill some of that insight to enable prospective authors to better prepare their manuscripts prior to submission rather than face the disappointment of rejection afterward. Therefore, in this Editors’ Insights piece, we would like to share what we have learned from the hundreds of manuscripts we have dealt with at Business & Society, as well as our broader experience as authors, reviewers, and editors. In so doing, we hope to begin a conversation about what the appropriate and desired characteristics of a theoretical contribution should be in our field. Over the years, many journal editors have opened similar discussions on what constitutes a theoretical contribution in their respective journals. In particular, journals with a specific mission with regard to theory development, such as Academy of Management Review (e.g., Byron & Thatcher, 2016; Corley & Gioia, 2011; Suddaby, 2014; Whetten, 1989) and Administrative Science Quarterly (e.g., Sutton & Staw, 1995; Weick, 1995), have discussed at some length the appropriate standards for a theoretical contribution and indeed what management theory should or should not look like. We would strongly encourage prospective authors to avail themselves of some of the excellent resources made available in these articles. In the following, however, what we would like to particularly focus on is what a theoretical contribution means in the specific context of the business and society field.

Defining the Scope of Business & Society

Our vision for Business & Society is for the journal to become the leading, peer-reviewed outlet for scholarly work dealing specifically with the intersection of business and society. So what counts as the intersection of business and society? As a journal, we have to determine the boundaries of the field that we are covering. Certainly, we have found that when making decisions on whether manuscripts should go out for review, we must first decide whether the manuscript fits the journal. This is not an exact science—it is always a judgment call—but as editors, we feel it is necessary to provide prospective authors some guidance on what, in our opinion, fits and does not fit. As such the purpose of this Editors’ Insight is to clarify some of our thinking on this issue. Defining the scope of Business & Society is no simple task. As it says on the Business & Society website, “the scope of business and society scholarship is quite broad, but all papers should in a substantial way address the societal role, impacts and intersections of and with business.” Although this gives some initial guidance, it is necessary to expand. So as in any good management article, we start with a definition: Research in Business & Society seeks to critically understand and analyze the broader societal issues in which management is immersed. We can seek to look at the impact of business on a societal issue, we can seek to analyze a societal issue on business, or we can seek to look at the interplay of such an issue on business and society. To elaborate on this definition, we address three important questions. First, what does the business in Business & Society signify (the business relevance test)? Second, what does the society in Business & Society signify (the social relevance test)? Finally, what are the disciplinary boundaries and level of analysis relevant to the field? It is our hope that this will be the beginning of a fruitful conversation.

A New Era for Business & Society

It is quite a privilege to assume the editorship of a scholarly journal when much of the hard work has already been done. As the new editorial team responsible for editing Business & Society, we are inheriting a thriving enterprise that has convened a strong community of committed readers, authors, editors, and reviewers, which has a growing reputation for scholarly excellence, and that has in place an impressive process for reviewing manuscripts and putting out issue after issue, as it has done for the last 50 odd years. Our immediate predecessor, Duane Windsor, in particular has steered the journal a long way in his 8 years at the helm. This has involved instituting the online ScholarOne system for manuscript submission and review, and getting the journal listed on the Thomson Reuters Social Science Citation Index, not to mention significantly increasing the journal’s esteem and impact within the scholarly community. That being said, Business & Society, and the academic journal publishing business in general, are facing a number of challenges that suggest we are moving into something of a new era for the journal. It is not only an exciting time for us to be assuming control of Business & Society but also, it has to be said, a challenging time. Our field is experiencing considerable growth while being tasked with enhancing both the rigor and the relevance of our research. Also, the scholarly space we look to occupy is becoming increasingly competitive, whether in terms of getting the best work out there submitted to the journal, finding willing expert reviewers, or getting the attention of people who we think should be reading and citing what we publish. Even the way that people discover and access the journal is undergoing a major shift as we witness the relentless incursion of digital technology into journal publishing. With so much change around us, we thought that it would be opportune to mark our first issue as editors with a few remarks on what we see as the defining characteristics of the new era that we are facing and what we think it means for the journal going forward in terms of our aims and ambitions for Business & Society.

Measuring Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact: Enhancing Quantitative Research Design and Methods in Business and Society Research:

An issue of Business & Society does not pass where there is not at least one, if not more, papers on corporate social responsibility (CSR) or corporate social performance (CSP). In fact, the field is obsessed with issues of performance and impact. Does CSR have an impact on financial performance? Or, perhaps more importantly, does CSR have an impact on social welfare or firm environmental performance? These questions go to the heart of our field and are related to its legitimacy as an area of intellectual inquiry. Still the answers to these questions are not clear and the results of research continue to be mixed. These motley results are no doubt due to the many methodological issues that such research faces. Still, progress is being made—slowly. As editors, the main reasons we desk reject quantitative papers are due to inattention to issues such as variable measurement, endogeneity, survey biases (Fowler, 2014), and other methodological issues. As we receive manuscripts from around the world, we see that many studies do not incorporate state-ofthe-art measurement and research design that would allow for the more rapid accumulation of knowledge. So in this Editors’ Insights, we want to draw your attention to ways we, as business and society researchers, can improve our quantitative methods for evaluating the impact of CSR engagement and related initiatives of the firm not only on financial performance but also on social well-being.

The Demand for Child Care Services in Canada

This Paper Examines the Determinants of the Demand for Child Care Services in Canada. Using Survey Data Collected for 1981 by Statistics Canada and Probit Analysis We Find That the Likelihood of Using Child Care Services Increases with Variables Such As the Education of the Mother and the Age of the Child and Decreases with the Number of Children in the Family.