Business Strategy and Development最新文献

To attain sustained economic development, organizations need to commit resources to proactive environmental measures. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the influence of customer heterogeneity on proactive environmental strategies (PES). Specifically, we study whether the type of customers, along with other customer factors such as concentration, internationalization, and cooperation, impacts a firm's spending policies on environmental protection. Empirical research has been conducted on a sample of 798 Spanish industrial firms. Our results confirm that the type of customer, whether a company or a final consumer, influences environmental protection policies. However, this was not the case for public entities. Furthermore, internationalization and cooperation with clients are other factors to consider in environmental protection decisions, yet customer concentration is not significant. Finally, we present our key conclusions along with insightful contributions for managers, public administrators, and final consumers as relevant agents under social pressure to support sustainable development.

Despite new global efforts promoting a bio-based transition, the widespread adoption of bioeconomy initiatives remains limited. We argue that this slow progress is due to the neglect of the governance dimension in bioeconomy strategies. Our study aims to fill this gap by offering a conceptual framework focusing on the governance concept from New Institutional Economics and Transaction Cost Economics. Existing research on bioeconomy governance has so far ignored the transaction costs involved in coordinating the interests of various stakeholders. We argue that for bioeconomy strategies to succeed, their benefits must outweigh their costs, hence comparing various alternative solutions becomes a pivotal step in comprehensively understanding and evaluating these trade-offs. Here we propose a governance framework that equips actors with the necessary tools to systematically evaluate the merits of different options, whether comparing different bioeconomy initiatives or contrasting bioeconomy approaches against traditional practices.

While men currently comprise the majority of workers in the logistics sector, the number of women is increasing steadily and their role is developing as they progress in education and training. Given these developments, this study aims to identify the criteria that affect women's gender equality in the logistics sector in terms of their individual, family, and business life. The identified criteria were evaluated using the PIPRECIA-E (PIvot Pairwise RElative Criteria Importance Assessment Extended) method in order to develop a new model. Based on the literature review, three main and 14 subcriteria were identified. The criteria weights were determined by eight women logistics experts. The results of using the PIPRECIA-E method were compared with those from the SWARA (Step-Wise Weight Assessment Ratio Analysis) method. The findings indicated that the most important main criteria determining gender equality are Family Conditions, with subcriteria including Motivation (Intrinsic or Extrinsic), Family Responsibilities, and Work-Life Balance.

This study investigates how dispersion in Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) ratings affects corporate innovation in BRICS economies, focusing on the financial channels through which this effect operates. Drawing on sustainable development, corporate governance, stakeholder theory, and innovation research, we argue that divergent ESG assessments from different rating agencies create uncertainty about a firm's true sustainability performance. This uncertainty raises firms' cost of capital and constrains trade credit, limiting the financial flexibility necessary for innovation investment. Using a comprehensive sample of BRICS firms from 2009 to 2023, we find that higher ESG rating dispersion significantly reduces corporate innovation, with stronger effects for firms facing severe financial constraints or persistently high rating disagreements. Robustness tests, including variable substitution, negative binomial and pooled regressions, dynamic panel models, and two-stage least squares estimation, confirm the reliability of these results. The study makes a novel contribution by identifying ESG rating dispersion as a previously underexplored barrier to corporate innovation in emerging markets and by demonstrating how non-financial information asymmetries propagate through financial channels to shape firm behavior. Practically, managers should enhance ESG transparency to reduce information frictions; investors can treat rating dispersion as an innovation risk signal; and policymakers in BRICS countries can implement standardized ESG reporting frameworks, provide targeted incentives, and promote stakeholder education to foster corporate innovation.

Barriers to women's participation in family businesses, both within and beyond the family, may hinder their performance. This study focuses on exploring and assessing the significant barriers that women experience in their family-owned businesses and examining the impact of these barriers on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the pursuit of the circular economy. The study employed the convenience sampling method, followed by snowball sampling, to collect data from regions of North India in order to obtain direct, personalized, and valuable information. Semi-structured interview questions were developed, with input from experts, to explore the barriers faced by women entrepreneurs and to understand how these barriers impact the SDGs in the pursuit of the circular economy. After validation of the findings with experts, respondents, and previous studies, the barriers identified include primogeniture, invisibility, role incongruity or role conflict, lack of family support, low self-confidence, the “old boys' network,” lack of role models, social attitudes, lack of prior experience, work–life balance, and limited managerial, leadership, and financial skills. These barriers significantly affect women owners during their entrepreneurial endeavors. Moreover, they limit women's contributions toward gender equality as well as personal, social, and national growth. Academic institutions and governments should address the barriers identified in this study that affect women's participation in family entrepreneurial activities. Women are vital members of both family and society; their personal, financial, and intellectual development contributes to overall societal progress and positively impacts the SDGs—particularly SDG 5 (Gender Equality), SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), and SDG 10 (Reduced Inequalities) in the pursuit of the circular economy. This is one of the foremost studies aligning the barriers to women's participation in family businesses with the SDGs in the pursuit of the circular economy.

This paper examines how sovereign green bonds, artificial intelligence (AI) adoption, and child-labor policies relate to corporate environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance. The analysis uses a panel of 2239 firm-year observations from 51 countries during 2019–2023 to explore these relationships. Sovereign green bonds are positively associated with governance and show a small positive link to social performance, while the environmental association is weaker, reflecting the slower pace of project execution and verification. During the COVID-19 period, the interaction between sovereign programs and the pandemic is positive for environmental and governance pillars, indicating a buffering effect. AI adoption is positively related to all three pillars. Child-labor policies are associated with higher scores, especially in the social and governance dimensions, with an additional environmental gain. These results highlight pillar-specific pathways through which public green finance, digital capabilities, and labor standards shape firm-level sustainability.