ABSTRACT:Existing research on certifiable management standards (CMS) and corporate social responsibility (CSR) tends to focus on large companies and is characterised by disagreement about the role of these standards as drivers of CSR. We contribute to the literature by shifting the analytical focus to the behaviour of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that subscribe to multiple CSR related standards. We argue that, in respect of motive and commitment, SMEs are not as different from large companies as the literature suggests, as (...) they are guided by similar institutional and economic motives. Results, based on ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001 certified SMEs in Greece, demonstrate that later adopters are more susceptible to coercive and mimetic motives and are less likely to commit fully to the CMS requirements, while earlier adopters react to normative motives and considerations of internal efficiency gains and tend to carry out CMS requirements with greater diligence. (shrink)

The disaggregation and geographic dispersion of global value chains (GVCs) have expanded the responsibility of international buyers from firm-level corporate social responsibility (CSR) towards social sustainability of their emerging country suppliers. We theorize, in this paper, that the effectiveness of lead firms’ GVC governance strategies for social sustainability—which can be audit-based or cooperation-based—depends on the local institutional context of the supplier. Supplier country institutions exert legal and civil society pressures for social sustainability, which shape suppliers’ attitude and receptiveness towards lead (...) firm requests. Using unique primary data from 356 garment and footwear suppliers in 11 emerging countries, which supply to Western European or North American buyers, we show that GVC governance strategies are particularly effective for suppliers’ social sustainability implementation when there is ‘contextual fit’ with local institutional pressures for social sustainability in the supplier country. Our study identifies the boundary conditions of GVC governance modes, and demonstrates a complementary relationship between organizational arrangements and their institutional-level counterparts in the context of social sustainability. (shrink)

This paper explores the underlying factors behind the collapse of commercial archaeology in Spain, with implications for other international contexts. It contributes to the current global debate about heritage ethics, adding nuance and conceptual depth to critical management studies and cultural heritage management in their approach to business ethics. Similar to other European contexts, Spanish archaeological management thrived during the 1990s and 2000s as a business model based on policies directed at safeguarding cultural heritage. The model had controversial ethical implications (...) at academic, policy and business levels. However, the global financial crisis of 2008 had a huge impact on this sector, and more than 70% of the Spanish archaeological companies closed by 2017. Drawing on the concepts of abstract narratives, functional stupidity and corporatist neoliberalism, this paper illustrates the need to examine ethical issues from a pragmatic standpoint, beyond epistemological and moralistic critiques of profit-oriented businesses in the cultural realm. In doing so, it connects the fields of cultural heritage and management studies, opening up hitherto unexplored strands of research and debate. (shrink)

Ethical issues in non-financial auditing are increasingly under scrutiny and questions have been raised about the impartiality and independence of audits. Among many other problematic issues, firms have discretion to select their assurance providers and are also required to cover the cost of the audit. Previous literature highlighted several consequences of this competitive and client-driven environment. However, research has mainly focused on firm-level investigation of the consequences—in this paper, we enhance this research by also considering assurance providers. Our approach is (...) grounded in legitimacy and institutional perspectives and we study how organizational motives and selection of assurance providers impact the benefits arising from the audit. In particular, we assume that firms select their assurance providers on the basis of audit strictness (substantial auditing) and market credibility (symbolic auditing) and we study the operational and market benefits that arise from the audit. Based on the data collected from 597 firms, we demonstrate that internal motives drive firms to be more likely to select assurance providers that offer audit strictness, while external motives drive firms to be more likely to select assurance providers that offer market credibility. The findings further show that assurance providers associated with auditing strictness have a stronger effect on operational benefits compared to assurance providers that offer market credibility. We also find that firms’ motives alone are important in driving the benefits achieved. These findings provide a basis for exploring the ethical implications of non-financial auditing. (shrink)