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Public issues regarding water are defined based on aspects of ownership and institutional responsibility, which has repercussions on their ability to implement effective actions for water resource management. The objective of this paper is to analyze government actions regarding urban water management and explain how they influence its institutional capacity. The methodology employed involved the use of institutional ethnography, which revealed the interactions between water resource management agencies and the priority action plans of governments. The findings recognize that the lack of institutional capacity is influenced by the particular interests of decision-makers who limit the political continuity of previous administrations. It is concluded that each administration addresses public issues according to their own interests, which may not always align with the needs and priorities of society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Several studies in the environmental literature have argued that the commitment to sustainable development can benefit companies in several ways. However, this strategy does not seem to be destined to maximizing short-term profit. This paper attempts to give an insight on some of the implications that the owners with the greatest potential for influencing the company's environmental performance strategy. Different ownership structures may imply different objectives to be pursued by the firm, and this may affect the environmental performance. Moreover, we analyze whether a good environmental performance may attract certain types of investors. We test these relationships by taking a sample of 82 U.S. and U.K. firms. Finally, we discuss the results and offer the conclusions of our study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores whether payout ratios of Chilean companies are explained by the extent of potential agency conflicts between controlling and minority shareholders. I use both panel data regression analysis and an event study to test different hypothesis related to the effect of corporate governance on payout policies. The results show that in the context of an emerging economy, such as Chile, that presents high ownership concentration and extensive use of conglomerates and pyramid structures, the rent-seeking theory of the effect of agency problems on payout policies seems to be especially relevant. Companies that present a higher degree of coincidence between cash flow rights and control rights tend to have more generous dividend policies. On the other hand, unexpectedly high dividend announcements made by companies with potentially higher agency conflicts present higher abnormal returns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]