In highly structured organisational fields individual efforts to deal rationally with uncertainty and constraints tend to lead, in the aggregate, to greater homogeneity in structure, culture and output. Drawing on institutional theory, this paper develops research propositions regarding the nature and scope of corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement at trade/industry association level. The cases of the water and sewerage and film industries are used in order to test these propositions. The findings suggest that (a) trade associations in more (...) homogeneous industries are more likely to engage with CSR‐related issues; (b) trade associations in industries that face greater external scrutiny and threats to legitimacy are more likely to engage with CSR‐related issues; and (c) trade associations are more likely to engage with those substantive CSR issues that are of greater concern to the industry's most salient stakeholders. The findings also suggest that trade associations may have a greater tendency to engage in symbolic legitimation efforts through CSR if faced with the task of repairing industry legitimacy. (shrink)

Trade associations operate under the premise of advancing the shared interests of their member firms. How well do they fulfill this role? This article measures the activity of 148 major industry trade associations over time and relates this activity to the performance of the relevant industries and dominant firms within them. Findings suggest that trade association spending increases when the profitability of the four largest firms in an industry decreases, but spending is unrelated to the profitability of (...) the industry overall. This implies that large firms exert control over trade association agendas and may use these communal organizations to advance their own interests rather than the shared interests of the entire industry. Moreover, it points to the need for further development of the currently anemic management literature on the activities of trade associations. (shrink)

This article introduces and develops the concept of trade narrative to understand how business sectors defend against public disapproval and the threat of increased regulation or removed subsidy. Trade narrative works by accumulating lists of benefits and occluding costs, and is created by consultants for economic interests organized via trade associations. This represents an under-analysed ‘policy-based evidence machine’, the aim of which is to format the discourses of the media and political classes about the contribution of the (...) sector in ways that frame political choice about what is thinkable and doable. In doing so it supports elite power by providing a relay for intra-elite communication. Using illustrations from privatized railways, banking and pharmaceuticals in the UK and US, the argument explores how the causal arrow runs in the opposite direction from that supposed in most discussion of discourse-economy relations in the field of cultural economy. (shrink)

Self-regulation exists at the firm-level, the industry-level, and the business-level of economic organization. Industry self-regulation has faced economic (free rider) and legal (antitrust) impediments to widespread implementation, although there exist examples of effective industry self-regulation, e.g., securities industry and the SEC, advertising and the FTC. By instituting industry codes of conduct, national trade associations have shown to be natural vehicles for self-regulation. While there has been long-standing general encouragement for establishing industry codes, adopting and enforcing conduct codes has been (...) seriously circumscribed by restrictive Supreme Court decisions and FTC advisory opinions. One approach to clearing legal confusion is to petition the FTC to issue an industry guide on promulgating and enforcing trade association codes of conduct. Another strategy is to utilize a stakeholder approach to association ethics committee appointments that subsequently influence code creation and enforcement. Finally, a new concept of an industry code of conduct will consist of three subcodes: an economic code; an environmental code; and a socio-political code. Combined, these strategic approaches will offer new opportunities for effective nonmarket regulation. (shrink)

As we combat the COVID-19 pandemic, both the prescription of antimicrobials and the use of biocidal agents have increased in many countries. Although these measures can be expected to benefit existing people by, to some extent, mitigating the pandemic's effects, they may threaten long-term well-being of existing and future people, where they contribute to the problem of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). A trade-off dilemma thus presents itself: combat COVID-19 using these measures, or stop using them in order to protect against (...) AMR. Currently, I argue, we are choosing to continue with these measures, and thus to prioritize combatting COVID-19, without adequate ethical reflection on the AMR-associated costs of these measures. I discuss the magnitude of the possible costs and benefits involved in making the trade-off in favour of COVID-19, and their distribution. I highlight two salient aspects of distribution that can help determine whether combatting COVID-19 whilst exacerbating AMR produces justly distributed costs and benefits: distribution between current and future populations, and distribution between existing geographical populations. Adopting this account, I argue that based on the magnitude and distribution of costs and benefits of combatting COVID-19, we have good reason to rethink this trade-off, and instead consider prioritizing protecting current and future people against AMR, but jettisoning measures against COVID-19 that also exacerbate AMR. (shrink)

Codes of conduct are the main tools to privately regulate worker rights in global value chains. Scholars have shown that while codes may improve outcome standards (such as occupational health and safety), they have had limited impact on process rights (such as freedom of association and collective bargaining). Scholars have, though, only provided vague or general explanations for this empirical finding. We address this shortcoming by providing a holistic and detailed explanation, and argue that codes, in their current form, have (...) limited impact on trade union rights due to (i) buyers paying lip service to trade union rights, (ii) workers being treated as passive objects of regulation in codes of conduct, (iii) auditing being unable to detect and remediate violations of trade union rights, (iv) codes emphasizing parallel means of organizing, (v) suppliers having limited incentives for compliance, and (vi) codes being unable to open up space for union organizing when leveraged in grassroots struggles. Our arguments suggest that there is no quick fix for codes’ limited impact on trade union rights, and that codes, in their current form, have limited potential to improve trade union rights. We conclude by discussing ways in which codes of conduct, and private regulation of worker rights more generally, could be transformed to more effectively address trade union rights. (shrink)

As we combat the COVID-19 pandemic, both the prescription of antimicrobials and the use of biocidal agents have increased in many countries. Although these measures can be expected to benefit existing people by, to some extent, mitigating the pandemic's effects, they may threaten long-term well-being of existing and future people, where they contribute to the problem of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). A trade-off dilemma thus presents itself: combat COVID-19 using these measures, or stop using them in order to protect against (...) AMR. Currently, I argue, we are choosing to continue with these measures, and thus to prioritize combatting COVID-19, without adequate ethical reflection on the AMR-associated costs of these measures. I discuss the magnitude of the possible costs and benefits involved in making the trade-off in favour of COVID-19, and their distribution. I highlight two salient aspects of distribution that can help determine whether combatting COVID-19 whilst exacerbating AMR produces justly distributed costs and benefits: distribution between current and future populations, and distribution between existing geographical populations. Adopting this account, I argue that based on the magnitude and distribution of costs and benefits of combatting COVID-19, we have good reason to rethink this trade-off, and instead consider prioritizing protecting current and future people against AMR, but jettisoning measures against COVID-19 that also exacerbate AMR. (shrink)

The 1950s were a frenetic moment in the European integration process during which the European Economic Community (EEC), the ultimately abortive Free Trade Area (FTA), and subsequently the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) were all negotiated. Trade unions showed keen interest in these schemes; moreover, their own highly institutionalised cooperation suggested they might come to play a key role in shaping them. And yet scholars have argued how divergent traditions and domestic pressures precluded the emergence of a (...) coherent trade union platform on European unity. While not rejecting the structural weaknesses of union internationalism in this regard, this article asks why union centres nevertheless continued to engage with one another on the integration question. Focusing on the British Trade Unions Congress (TUC) and deploying a transnational approach to best understand the interaction between the national and international levels, it shows that union linkages still offered the TUC and its counterparts a valuable chance to learn from and persuade others – and even their governments – of their views, objectives and affairs. Such trade union diplomacy was thus in and of itself valuable despite wider union spats and misgivings, and did at times impact the broader language and approach of the countries involved. (shrink)

Inclusive trade is taking hold in various forms in international organizations and in the trade policy of national governments. Absent empirical evidence that will take time to generate, it can be difficult to assess the achievements of this new approach to trade. Nancy Fraser's three justice idioms provide a conceptual entry point for evaluating the potential of the inclusive trade agenda. Fraser argues that the contemporary global justice conversation must acknowledge claims for recognition, representation, and redistribution. (...) Applying this conceptualization to the inclusive trade agenda shows that trade agreement provisions intended to favor women and Indigenous peoples go some distance in addressing claims for recognition and representation but accomplish less in remedying injustices associated with maldistribution. Therefore, the inclusive trade agenda does significantly advance global justice for marginalized groups, but works primarily in ways that are political and cultural, not economic. (shrink)

In On Trade Justice, Risse and Wollner defend an account of trade justice on which the central requirement, applying to both states and firms, is a requirement of non-exploitation. On their view, trade exploitation consists in ‘power-induced failure of reciprocity’, which generates an unfair distribution of the benefits and burdens associated with trade relationships. In this paper, I argue that while there are many appealing features of Risse and Wollner’s account, their discussion does not articulate and (...) develop the unified picture of states’ and firms’ obligations that they aim to provide as clearly as it might have. In particular, it is, I claim, unclear exactly how they understand the relationship between the fairness-based requirements that apply to states and those that apply to firms. I argue that there are two types of accounts that they might accept: a transactional account and a structural account. I offer reasons to think that there are reasons to prefer a structural account. In addition, I note some of the key implications of accepting such an account, and suggest that if Risse and Wollner accept these implications and revise other aspects of their view accordingly, the result is a plausible and unified account of what trade justice requires. (shrink)

In recent years, trade-control laws and regulations such as embargoes and sanctions have gained importance. However, there is limited empirical research on the ways in which small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) respond to such coercive economic measures. Building on the literature on organizational responses to external demands and behavioral ethics, this study addresses this issue to better understand how external pressures and managerial decision-making are associated with the scope of trade-control compliance programs. Based on a sample of 289 (...) SMEs, the findings show that the organizational responses of SMEs reflect proportionate adjustments to regulatory pressures but only if decision-makers are well informed and aware of the prevailing rules and regulations. Conversely, uninformed decision-making leads to a disproportionate response resulting in an inadequately reduced scope of the compliance program. In addition, the results indicate that SMEs that are highly integrated into supply chains are susceptible to passing-the-buck behavior. (shrink)

Fair trade is an ethical alternative to neoliberal market practices. This article examines the development of the fair trade movement, both in Mexico and abroad, beginning with the experience of UCIRI (Unión de Comunidades Indígenas de la Región del Istmo – Union of Indigenous Communities of the Isthmus Region), an association of small coffee growers in Mexico and a main actor in the creation of the first fair trade seal in the world, Max Havelaar, in 1988. Future (...) success of the fair trade movement depends mainly on resolving the tension between the capitalist business goals and the activist transformation goals of its diverse practitioners. (shrink)

Student well-being and its relationships with academic achievement in China have not been well-investigated. This study aimed at investigating student well-being and the trade-off of the well-being and academic achievement with a sample of 1,353 Chinese high-school students from four cities in China during coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic period. The six dimensions of well-being were utilised to test the relationships with three subjects including Mathematics, English, and Chinese using a quantitative analysis. In this study, the relationships between six dimensions (...) of well-being and three academic subject achievements were tested in one statistical model. Results showed that spiritual well-being was ranked the highest, followed by psychological, physical, self, and social well-being. Students gave the lowest ranking to academic well-being. The two significant paths identified were between spiritual well-being and two subjects, namely, Chinese and Mathematics. It is interesting to note that the other five dimensions of well-being were significantly associated with any subjects and English was not significantly related to any dimensions of well-being in this study. Our findings suggested that policymakers and other stakeholders should avoid an “all or nothing” mindset on practice when considering well-being as a multidimensional construct. (shrink)

The lead trade associations of the bio-pharma and semiconductor industries have differed systematically in their roles in facilitating the development of innovation networks between Shanghai and Shenzhen, two prominent high-tech metropolises in China. Divergent associational roles stem from variations in the regional state policy regime that has exerted differential shaping influence on the structure of social cleavages and strength of reciprocity norms among member firms and on their willingness to actively and cooperatively engage in association-led networking activities. The bio-pharma (...) and semiconductor associations whose network-building roles have been structured differently through varied state policy regimes have displayed dissimilar abilities to reduce network failures and promote the innovation competences of their member firms between the two metropolises. The empirical findings of the article carry important implications for understanding the causes and consequences of varied associational roles in the process of technology development in China, other emerging markets, and beyond. (shrink)

After briefly surveying the mission and principles of the World Trade Organization (WTO), I argue that international trade may be assessed from the perspective of justice, and that the correct account of justice for these purposes is egalitarian in fundamental principle. I then consider the merits of the WTO's basic commitment to liberalized trade in the light of egalitarian considerations. Finally, I discuss the justice of several WTO policies. While noting the complexity of the empirical issues relating (...) to the effects of trade institutions and policies, I conclude that egalitarians have reasons to object to certain of the principles and policies of the WTO. (shrink)

In the literature, Fair Trade (FT) goods are usually associated with other products differentiated by process attributes such as organic food, genetically modified (GM) food or child labour-free clothing. All of these products are regarded as credence goods. This classification refers to the simplified definition of credence goods, which describes product attributes which consumers cannot evaluate, even after having consumed the good. Focusing on the characteristics of FT goods, this article proposes a reassessment of the link between FT goods (...) and credence properties as defined by Darby and Kami. We first demonstrate that (1) the usual classification masks important particularities of FT goods compared to other goods with process attributes and (2) the full definition of credence goods may even provide a better description of the quality of FT goods. However - and this is our second theoretical contribution - the lack of consensus among experts concerning FT standards and their level of efficiency encourage us to consider FT goods as indeterminate goods as defined by Lupton. This result leads us to suggest a new typology of product attributes summarized in an innovative diagram. It sheds light on how competition between the different FT approaches works and why the FT market is still confined to a niche, if not threatened with collapse. We mainly illustrate our theoretical analysis with observations relating to the French FT market and institutions. (shrink)

The worldwide growth of franchising has been phenomenal during the past decade. At the same time there has been increased media attention to questionable business practices in franchising. Similar to some trade associations and professions, franchising has sought self-regulation by developing codes of conduct or ethics. This study examines the codes of ethics covering franchising activities in 21 countries. The results reveal that there is considerable variation in the activities/issues covered by the codes. Specifically, the codes cover most stages (...) of the franchising relationship, focus on a narrow set of stakeholders, are short on ethical guidance, and offer few enforcement provisions. The implications of these findings for international franchising and research are discussed. (shrink)

This essay provides a brief overview of the rise of organ trade in Pakistan towards the end of the last century and the concerted, collective struggle—of physicians and medical associations aided by the media, journalists, members of civil society, and senior judiciary—in pressuring the government to bring about and implement a national law criminalizing such practices opposed by an influential pro-organ trade lobby. It argues that among the most effective measures to prevent re-emergence of organ trafficking in the (...) country is increasing ethical live donations and above all, establishing sustainable, public supported deceased donor programs. To do this, the transplant community must recognize that organ transplantation is not merely a donor-recipient-physician transaction but a complex issue in which decisions to donate an organ are influenced by indigenous values and belief systems about human illness, life and death. (shrink)

Welfare-friendly outdoor poultry husbandry systems are associated with potentially higher public health risks for certain hazards, which results in a dilemma: whether to choose a system that improves chicken welfare or a system that reduces these public health risks. We studied the views of citizens and poultry farmers on judging the dilemma, relevant moral convictions and moral arguments in a practical context. By means of an online questionnaire, citizens (n = 2259) and poultry farmers (n = 100) judged three practical (...) cases, which illustrate the dilemma of improving chicken welfare or reducing public health risks for Campylobacter, avian influenza and dioxin. Furthermore, they scored the importance of moral arguments and to what extend they agreed with moral convictions related to humans and chickens. Citizens were more likely than farmers to choose a system that benefits chicken welfare at the expense of public health. These different judgments could be explained by differing moral convictions and valuations of moral arguments. Judgments of citizens and farmers were associated with moral arguments and convictions, predominantly with those regarding the value of chickens and naturalness. Citizens agreed stronger with moral convictions regarding the intrinsic value of chickens and regarding naturalness than farmers did, while farmers agreed stronger with conviction regarding fairness. We argue that opinions of citizens and farmers are context-dependent, which may explain the differences between these groups. It implies that opinions of different stakeholder groups should be considered in order to achieve successful innovations in poultry husbandry, which are supported by society. (shrink)

Social relations associated with conventional agricultural exports find their origins in long term associations based on business, family, and class alliances. Working outside these boundaries presents a host of challenges, especially where small producers with little economic or political power are concerned. Yet, in many developing countries, alternative trade organizations (ATOs) based on philosophies of social justice and/or environmental well-being are carving out spaces alongside traditional agricultural export sectors by establishing new channels of trade and marketing. Coffee provides (...) a case in point, with the fair trade and certified organic movements making inroads into the market place. In their own ways, these movements represent a type of economic and social restructuring from below, drawing upon and developing linkages beyond the traditional boundaries of how coffee is produced and traded. An examination of the philosophies of the fair trade and organic coffee movements reveal that the philosophical underpinnings of both certified organic and fair-trade coffee run counter to the historical concerns of coffee production and trade. Associations of small producers involved in these coffees face stiff challenges – both internal and external to their groups. More work, especially in situ fieldwork aimed at uncovering the challenges, benefits, tensions, and successes, is needed to understand better the ways these networks operate in the dynamic agro-food complex. (shrink)

I examine the evolution of trade organizations in the southwest from their early manifestation to their present configurations with a particular focus on Trading Posts as socio-cultural and economic exchange organizations. At their inception as general stores they served displaced and remote populations, while at their peak they were social, cultural, and economic hubs connecting various ethnic groups. More recently, they have become non-profit and profit entities, both on- and off-reservation, and tribal government organizations, some of which still incorporate (...) notions of socially responsible business. (shrink)

The Stabilization and Association Agreement with the Republic of Kosovo is a new chapter in the new institutional and social functioning because it has direct impact on the citizens’ life in our country. The effects of the agreement are not only in trading but those are multiple effects, since they do touch the political stability, the rule of law, democratic governance, economic development, trade exchange, regional economic cooperation, etc. and therefore the relevance of this agreement should not be seen (...) from a single viewpoint, but rather from a wider perspective and we should dedicate more attention to the direct legal and trading issues. This agreement in the short term will create perspective and hope, in the middle term, it will create political stability, whereas in the long term, it will bring economic development, and genuinely trading exchange. (shrink)

Welfare-friendly outdoor poultry husbandry systems are associated with potentially higher public health risks for certain hazards, which results in a dilemma: whether to choose a system that improves chicken welfare or a system that reduces these public health risks. We studied the views of citizens and poultry farmers on judging the dilemma, relevant moral convictions and moral arguments in a practical context. By means of an online questionnaire, citizens and poultry farmers judged three practical cases, which illustrate the dilemma of (...) improving chicken welfare or reducing public health risks for Campylobacter, avian influenza and dioxin. Furthermore, they scored the importance of moral arguments and to what extend they agreed with moral convictions related to humans and chickens. Citizens were more likely than farmers to choose a system that benefits chicken welfare at the expense of public health. These different judgments could be explained by differing moral convictions and valuations of moral arguments. Judgments of citizens and farmers were associated with moral arguments and convictions, predominantly with those regarding the value of chickens and naturalness. Citizens agreed stronger with moral convictions regarding the intrinsic value of chickens and regarding naturalness than farmers did, while farmers agreed stronger with conviction regarding fairness. We argue that opinions of citizens and farmers are context-dependent, which may explain the differences between these groups. It implies that opinions of different stakeholder groups should be considered in order to achieve successful innovations in poultry husbandry, which are supported by society. (shrink)

Pepper Culpepper’s seminal Quiet Politics and Business Power has revitalized the study of when business elites can shape policies away from public scrutiny. This article takes the concept of quiet politics to a new, and surprising, set of actors: trade union leaders. Focusing on the case of Denmark, it argues that quiet politics functions through political elite networks and that this way of doing politics favors a particular kind of corporatist coordination between the state, capital, and labor. Rather than (...) showing macrocorporatist coordination between the two classes and governments, it identifies representatives of business and labor that hold privileged positions in political elite networks. Representatives of segments are found in industries important for the Danish economy, specifically, the exporting manufacturing sector. Being at the core of the network requires not only a key position in the Danish economy but also an understanding that politics is often done best without politicians and voters. The analysis shows that trade union and business association representatives work closely on a wide number of issues through quiet politics, using their extensive network to broker and foster agreement between different stakeholders. (shrink)

Summary 1. Ecologists and conservation biologists consider many issues when designing a field study, such as the expected value of the data, the interests of the study species, the welfare of individual organisms and the cost of the project. These different issues or values often conflict; however, neither animal ethics nor environmental ethics provides practical guidance on how to assess trade-offs between them. -/- 2. We developed a decision framework for considering trade-offs between values in ecological research, drawing (...) on the field of ecological ethics. We used a case study of the population genetics of three frog species, in which a researcher must choose between four methods of sampling DNA from the study animals. We measured species welfare as the reduction in population growth rate following sampling, and assessed individual welfare using two different definitions: (i) the level of suffering experienced by an animal, and (ii) the level of suffering combined with loss of future life. -/- 3. Tipping the tails of tadpoles ranked as the best sampling method for species welfare, while collecting whole tadpoles and buccal swabbing of adult frogs ranked best for the first and second definitions of individual welfare, respectively. Toe clipping of adult frogs ranked as the worst sampling method for species welfare and the first definition of individual welfare, and equal worst for the second definition of individual welfare. -/- 4. When considering species and individual welfare simultaneously, toe clipping was clearly inferior to the other sampling methods, but no single sampling method was clearly superior to the other three. Buccal swabbing, collecting tadpoles and tail tipping were all preferred options, depending on the definition of individual welfare and the level of precision with which we assessed species welfare. -/- 5.Synthesis and applications. The decision framework we present can be used by ecologists to assess ethical and other trade-offs when planning field studies. A formal decision analysis makes transparent how a researcher might negotiate competing ethical, financial and practical objectives. Defining the components of the decision in this way can help avoid errors associated with human judgement and linguistic uncertainty. (shrink)

Freedom of association for trade union has been generally accepted as part of basic human rights in Islam. Freedom of association, which include the right to join and participate in trade union activities, can be susceptible to disputes between employers and employees as well as trade unions. Islam provides freedom of association in labour relations and also mechanisms to settle disputes pertaining to such freedom. Conciliation (sulh) and arbitration (tahkim) are both used methods in the inception of (...) Islam, which have similarities with the modern sense. We shall discuss in this article the right to dispute resolution between employers and trade unions in the context of freedom of association in labour relations as based on Shari’ah law and using modern legal systems of Islamic countries such as Iran, Malaysia and Saudi Arabia as examples. (shrink)

Challenging the new political-economic “mainstream” that considers trade unions to be “complicit” in labor market dualization, this article’s analysis of union strategies in Italy and South Korea, most-different union movements perceived as unlikely cases for the pursuit of broader social solidarity, shows that in both countries unions have successively moved away from insider-focused strategies and toward “solidarity for all” in the industrial relations arena as well as in their social policy preferences. Furthermore, unions explored new avenues of political agency, (...) often in alliance with civil society organizations. This convergent trend toward a social model of unionism is ascribed to a response of unions to a “double crisis”: that is, a socioeconomic crisis, which takes the form of a growing periphery of the labor market associated with growing social exclusion, and a sociopolitical crisis, which takes the form of an increasing marginalization of the unions from the political process. (shrink)

Public Health Science and practice expanded during the course of the 20th century. Initially focused on controlling infectious disease through basic public health programs regulating water, sanitation and food, by 1988 the Institute of Medicine broadly declared that “public health is what we, as a society, do collectively to. assure the conditions for people to be healthy.” Commensurate with this definition, public health practitioners and policymakers today work on ;in enormous range of issues. The 2002 policy agenda of the American (...) Public Health Association reflects positions on genomics’ role in public health; national health and safety standards for child care programs; sodium in Americans’ diets; the health and safety of emergency rescue workers; and war in Central Asia and the Persian Gulf. (shrink)

The current ethical norms of genomic biobanking creating and maintaining large repositories of human DNA and/or associated data for biomedical research have generated criticism from every angle, at both the practical and theoretical levels. The traditional research model has involved investigators seeking biospecimens for specific purposes that they can describe and disclose to prospective subjects, from whom they can then seek informed consent. In the case of many biobanks, however, the institution that collects and maintains the biospecimens may not itself (...) be directly involved in research, instead banking the biospecimens and associated data for other researchers. Moreover, the future uses of biospecimens may be unknown, if not unknowable, at the time of collection. Biobanking may thus stretch the meanings of inform and consent to their breaking point: if you cannot inform subjects about what their biospecimens will be used for, what can they consent to? Given that informed consent by individual subjects is the ethical gold standard, the seeming dilution of the concept in the context of biobanking is a profound problem. (shrink)

Since the early twentieth century, speculators have used visual methods to detect future trends in prices. The resulting visual hermeneutics has become known as ‘technical analysis’. Although it has some mathematical elements, however, its genealogy is much stranger. This essay traces elements of this tradition including its associations with vibrations and cycles, numerology, astrology and hermeticism. Elements of these traditions can be detected in mainstream trading manuals even today.

In recent studies, numerous anomalies against the weak and semi-strong-forms of efficient market hypothesis have been found insignificant after controlling the small-firm effect. We investigate whether the insider trading anomaly, a major anomaly against the strong-form of EMH, can survive after excluding small firms with a novel data set and document several new findings. We find a substantially larger number of insider purchases than sales, while the average volume of insider sales is much higher than the average volume of insider (...) purchases. Echoing recent US studies, we find that insider sales generate more abnormal returns than insider purchases do. We find much lower abnormal returns from insider trading than documented in the literature and the associated trading costs, which suggests that the market efficiency of individual stocks may depend on their sizes, and even the strong-form of EMH holds to a larger extent than previously recognized. (shrink)

In 1538–39 Francisco de Vitoria delivered two relections:De IndisandDe iure belli.This article distills from these writings the topic of free trade as a “human right” in accordance withius gentiumor the “law of peoples.” The right to free trade is rooted in a more fundamental right to communication and association. The rights to travel, to dwell, and to migrate precede the right to trade, which is also closely connected to the rights to preach, to protect converts, and to (...) constitute Christian princes. This has significant repercussions on the field of business ethics: the right to free trade is ultimately founded directly on natural law and indirectly on divine law; trade is not independent of ethics; and trade is presented as an opportunity to develop the virtues of justice and friendship, among other repercussions. Vitoria is portrayed as a defender of private initiative and free markets. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Business networks, which include joint ventures, supply chains, industry and trade associations, industrial districts, and community business associations, are considered the signature organizational form of the global economy. However, little is known about how they affect the social performance of their members. We utilize institutional theory to develop the position that business social performance has collectivist roots that deserve at least as much scholarly attention as owner/manager characteristics and business attributes. Hypotheses are tested using multilevel analysis on data gathered (...) from 898 members of twenty-nine business associations. Support is provided for institutional theory’s explanation for business social performance. Members of business associations are likely to conform to the pattern of social performance prevailing in their association, but not necessarily to the articulated values of the association. The potential of business associations to influence members’ social performance should be considered by agencies that start and support them as mechanisms for regional and local economic development. (shrink)

The DSM-5 Alternative Model for Personality Disorders dimensionally defines personality pathology using severity of dysfunction and maladaptive style. As the empirical literature on the clinical utility of the AMPD grows, there is a need to examine changes in diagnostic profiles and personality expression in treatment over time. Assessing these changes in individuals diagnosed with borderline personality disorder is complicated by the tendency for patients to cycle through multiple therapists over the course of treatment leaving the potential for muddled diagnostic clarity (...) and disjointed case conceptualizations. Following patient trajectories across therapists offers a unique opportunity to examine the AMPD’s sensitivity to and utility for capturing personality stability and change over time for patients with BPD. This article demonstrates the utility of the AMPD for two clinical cases in three distinct ways: highlighting heterogeneity in BPD between patients, comparing improvements in personality severity and style over time, and elucidating profile change across therapist ratings. We present two patients diagnosed with DSM-5 Section II BPD, crossing between two therapists over the course of 3 years of psychodynamic psychotherapy. Treating clinicians rated patients for their respective treatment phases using the Level of Personality Functioning Scale, capturing severity, and the Personality Inventory for the DSM-5, capturing style. AMPD diagnostic profiles differentiated patients with BPD in both severity and style, and captured within-patient change beyond within-therapist response bias. Results indicated greater improvements in personality severity while personality style remained more stable. Implications for the patients’ treatment progress and associated challenges are discussed, as are considerations for the utility of the AMPD in therapy. (shrink)

This study examines the impact of Fair Trade on the sustainability of coffee growing. To examine sustainability we use an ethnographic approach, interviewingproducers and their associated buyers working in Fair Trade organizations in Chiapas Mexico. We focus on social, economic and ecological dimensions of the producers’ and buyers’ experience.

The doctor-patient relationship is usually seen and accepted as a giving-taking association, in which the doctor is a giver and the patient is a taker. The paper challenges such a one-way relationship, and stresses the patient as a giver and the doctor as a receiver. The patient is described as a source for the emotional development of the doctor, and as a source of knowledge. He is also a source for what could be called life experience. By serving as a (...) source for these three elements, the patient is also seen as a source for reward. There is a danger of under-utilisation of this reward by the doctor, when (1) he is engaged only in giving, (2) he wilfully obstructs the channel of information, and (3) he feels saturation called by the doctor experience. This under-utilisation will ultimately lead to medical parasitism. This parasitism is seldom recognised by the patient, because the arrest of development of a doctor is usually hardly noticed, and this will lead to neglect of the patient, so that the trade between doctor and patient becomes unfair, as the long-term investment which the patient has placed in the doctor, does not pay off any longer. (shrink)

“Explanation” refers to a wide range of activities, with a family resemblance between them. Most satisfactory explanations in a discipline for a domain fail to satisfy some general desiderata, while fulfilling others. This can happen in various ways. Why? An idealizing response would be to say that in real science explanations fall short along some dimensions, so that for any explanatory failure there is a conceivable improvement that addresses its shortcomings. The improvement may be more accurate causally or possess more (...) unifying power, or deliver deeper understanding. We formulate a drastically less idealizing response. We argue that there are typically trade-offs in explanation, so that in strengthening one explanatory virtue one will usually weaken another. Scientific explanations, if this is correct, are constrained by such trade-offs. Particular trade-offs are appropriate for particular explanatory vehicles. There are the overarching equations of theoretical physics, which produce unification at the expense of causal detail; there are theoretical models of phenomena that occupy a middle ground between generality and the detailed workings of particular cases and get closer to explaining the workings of specific systems at the expense of unification. Sometimes experiments aim at general causal patterns at the expense of particular detail; and sometimes they are designed to give us information of particular detail at the expense of generality. There are further trade-offs associated with other vehicles of explanation. We provide examples from physics and biology. (shrink)

Fair trade has been researched extensively. However, our understanding of why consumers might be reluctant to purchase fair trade goods, and the associated potential barriers to the wider adoption of fair trade products, is incomplete. Based on data from 409 USA participants, our study demonstrates some of the psychological processes that underlie the rejection of fair trade products by conservatives. Our findings show that political conservatism affects fair trade perspective-taking and fair trade identity, and (...) these latter two subsequently affect fair trade purchase intention. The decrease in fair trade perspective-taking and fair trade identity are two psychological features that potentially shield conservatives from the appeals of fair trade products. We extend prior research on the effects of political ideology on consumption not only by demonstrating the predisposition of highly conservative consumers towards prosocial consumption, but also by showing the internal functioning of the conservative decision-making process. We further demonstrate that the effect of conservatism on fair trade purchase deliberation is moderated by age and income. Age reduces the negative effect of conservatism on fair trade perspective-taking, whereas income heightens the negative effect of conservatism on fair trade perspective-taking. Our results suggest that fair trade initiatives can target the conservative consumer segment in high-income countries with a greater chance of success when applying marketing strategies that make perspective-taking redundant and that aim at younger consumers with lower incomes. (shrink)

The popularity of direct-to-consumer genetic ancestry services has exploded over the past five years, with as many as 250 direct-to-consumer genetic ancestry testing companies currently operating and estimates that 1 in 5 Americans are customers of one or more of those companies. Marketing of genetic ancestry testing has consistently linked the results of DNA testing to a consumer’s racial and ethnic identity, and, because of that, can help consumers find out “who they really are.” We argue that the “biologization” of (...) race and ethnicity promoted in such marketing violates norms of marketing ethics. In particular, we show that this marketing technique violates a number of the core commitments and values of the American Marketing Association Statement of Ethics. (shrink)

Research targeting emotion’s impact on relational episodic memory has largely focused on spatial aspects, but less is known about emotion’s impact on memory for an event’s temporal associations. The present research investigated this topic. Participants viewed a series of interspersed negative and neutral images with instructions to create stories linking successive images. Later, participants performed a surprise memory test, which measured temporal associations between pairs of consecutive pictures where one picture was negative and one was neutral. Analyses focused on how (...) the order of negative and neutral images during encoding influenced retrieval accuracy. Converging results from a discovery study (N = 72) and pre-registered replication study (N = 150) revealed a “forward-favouring” effect of emotion in temporal memory encoding: Participants encoded associations between negative stimuli and subsequent neutral stimuli more strongly than associations between negative stimuli and preceding neutral stimuli. This finding may reflect a novel trade-off regarding emotion’s effects on memory and is relevant for understanding affective disorders, as key clinical symptoms can be conceptualised as maladaptive memory retrieval of temporal details. (shrink)

Global supply chains often distribute value inequitably among the Global North and South. This perpetuates poverty and contributes to indecent work in raw material-producing countries, thus creating challenges to sustainable development. For decades, corporate social responsibility, social entrepreneurship, and sustainable business model innovations have aimed to distribute value more equitably across global value chains, for instance via fair trade, alternative trade, and direct trade. This article examines a novel and hitherto understudied innovation for equitable value distribution in (...) global supply chains: “value chain profit sharing.” We draw on interview and archival data from two cases of social entrepreneurs working in the coffee sector to develop a generalized model. One of the model's key features is that the entrepreneur pays suppliers in multiple installments that reflect market conditions (as opposed to a single lump sum based on prediction). We show how this can increase value creation, appropriation, and equitable distribution. Although our research suggests that this model may be highly contingent on leaders' skills, resources, sense of place, and accountability to suppliers, we find no evidence that its applications are limited to specific countries or sectors. Our research further extends extant theory by showing how “value chain profit sharing” may relieve some of the tensions often associated with sustainable business models, including distributing value to suppliers while maintaining financial solvency; creating value while pursuing a social mission; providing benefits to suppliers without curtailing their market opportunities; responding to market conditions while maintaining commitments to suppliers; and scaling without diluting benefits. It thereby contributes to the literatures on sustainable business model innovations, equitable value distribution in global supply chains, novel application of revenue-sharing contracts, and innovative methods of profit sharing. It furthermore provides actionable guidance for social entrepreneurs, corporate social responsibility practitioners, and supplier cooperatives aiming to achieve more equitable value distribution and sustainable supply chains. (shrink)

_This study examines the proposition that exports cause growth in gross domestic product GDP in the economy of Pakistan from 1973 to 2022. The study intends to analyze the export promotion strategy that was adopted by Pakistan's economy in the 1990s. Cointegration test reveals there is a long-run relationship between these two variables. However, causality is proved in both short and long-run from GDP to exports. The Trade openness and export growth both are prolonged association but in case of (...) Pakistan persistent depreciation of PKR could not achieve desired level of export earning which implies that J-Curve theory does not exist in Pakistan. This implies that growth in the domestic production base is vital to expansion in exports. The government or policymakers should give importance to and incentivize various production sectors of an economy so that they can contribute to the expansion of export markets._. (shrink)

This paper addresses the relationship between corporate political activities (CPA) and a firm’s customer orientation (CO) from a strategy perspective. Focussing on the potential negative implications of CPA, the paper argues that CPA over time may result in path-dependency for the focal strategic system and lead to a low level of customer orientation and strategic rigidity to readdress an appropriate level of CO.

Much of the methodological discussion around experiments in economics and other social sciences is framed in terms of the notions of internal and external validity. The standard view is that internal validity and external validity stand in a relationship best described as a _trade-off_. However, it is also commonly held that internal validity is a _prerequisite_ to external validity. This article addresses the problem of the compatibility of these two ideas and analyzes critically the standard arguments about the conditions under (...) which a trade-off between internal and external validity arises. Our argument stands against common associations of internal validity and external validity with the distinction between field and laboratory experiments and assesses critically the arguments that link the artificiality of experimental settings done in the laboratory with the purported trade-off between internal and external validity. We conclude that the idea of a trade-off or tension between internal and external validity seems, upon analysis, far less cogent than its intuitive attractiveness may lead us to think at first sight. (shrink)

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is one of the ways through which companies gain legitimacy. However, CSR actions themselves are subject to public skepticism because of increased public awareness of greenwashing and scandalous corporate behavior. Legitimacy of CSR actions is indeed influenced by the actions of the company but also is rooted in the basic cultural values of a society and in the ideologies of evaluators. This study examines the legitimacy of CSR actions of publicly traded forest products companies as compared (...) to family-owned forest products companies. Results indicate a lower legitimacy for CSR actions of publicly traded companies than for family-owned companies. The study also examines the effect of social responsibility orientation (SRO) of evaluators on the legitimacy accorded to companies' CSR actions. We found that SRO was negatively associated with legitimacy, especially for women. Perceived profitability of companies was negatively associated with legitimacy of CSR actions for publicly traded but not for family-owned companies. (shrink)

The article reports the findings of an empirical study among consumers, regarding the impact of physical, social, and psychological proximity on their engagement to the fair trade idea and purchasing behavior. Based on a random sample of 211 British and 112 Indian consumers and using structural equation modeling, it was found that high levels of physical, social, and psychological proximity leads to high consumer fair trade engagement. Moreover, consumer fair trade engagement was confirmed to have a positive (...) impact on fair trade purchasing behavior. Furthermore, consumer empathic concern was found to positively moderate the association between proximity and consumer fair trade engagement, while the opposite was true with regard to consumer hypocrisy. Finally, consumer nationality was found to have a control effect on physical, social, and psychological proximity, with the latter felt stronger among Indian, as opposed to British consumers. (shrink)

Selling fair-trade products can be problematic because of their higher price when compared with conventional alternatives. We propose that one way to solve this problem is to make consumers aware of the benefits of fair-trade. To this end, we perform three experimental studies to show that partitioned pricing (PP), which explicitly displays fair-trade as a separate price component, increases consumers’ purchase intention toward the fair-trade product. This effect can be explained by increased perceptions of price fairness, (...) which itself is mediated through transparency (but only if an additional verbal justification of the fair-trade price component is present). In the absence of such a verbal justification, recalled prices instead of transparency explain the positive effect of PP on consumers’ purchase intentions. Interestingly, boundary conditions of this effect barely exist. Our incentive-aligned study illustrates that PP is associated with a 20% increase in purchases of fair-trade products. The results demonstrate an opportunity to increase the market share of fair-trade products, which increases social welfare and sustainability. (shrink)