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This literature review delves into the intricate realm of pricing rules in the day-ahead electricity market, spurred by a notable surge in 2022 electricity prices. Employing a comparative analysis of uniform pricing (UP), discriminatory pricing (DP), and the Vickrey-Clarke-Groves (VCG) pricing rule, the study navigates the complexities of these mechanisms. The evaluation unveils contrasting perspectives: the political push for consumer-friendly low prices versus the efficiency aspiration for a self-regulating market. DP, minimizing average prices but increasing volatility, and VCG, excelling in productive efficiency, are pitted against UP, the prevailing yet imperfect norm. The findings underscore the nuances of each rule; DP leads to reduced average prices and heightened volatility, while VCG ensures superior productive efficiency. Despite UP's simplicity, it prompts inefficiencies and political costs. These insights illuminate the pivotal choice faced by policymakers, balancing efficiency, fairness, and market sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The rapid growth of social networking sites and video sharing platforms has created an opportunity for the alcohol industry to employ advanced advertising and marketing approaches to target their audiences, increasingly blurring the lines between commercial marketing and user-generated content, which poses a challenge for effective regulation. Methods: We conducted a systematic search through three peer-reviewed journal databases (WoS, PubMed, Scopus). Studies were included if published in English, after 2004, and assessed statutory regulation or voluntary industry codes, enacted by an EU or nation's governmental agency or private entity, and with the intent to restrict digital alcohol advertising. In addition, we conducted a manual search of gray literature. Results: A total of 4690 records were identified. After duplicate removal and full-text assessment, 14 articles were examined. Our findings indicate that children and adolescents may often be exposed to alcohol advertisements on social media and websites due to industry's self-regulatory age-affirmation systems being largely ineffective at preventing under-aged access. Cases of self-regulatory violations by the alcohol industry, and increasingly innovative 'gray-area' advertising approaches have also been noted. Additionally, research illustrates a lack of developed statutory restrictions of digital alcohol advertising and instead continued reliance on voluntary industry self-regulation. Conclusions: There is a substantial need for further research to examine the effectiveness of digital alcohol advertising restrictions in social media, websites and image/video sharing platforms. Moreover, there is a necessity for countries to develop comprehensive statutory frameworks, which would effectively restrict and monitor rapidly advancing digital alcohol advertising practices on new digital media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article deals with the process of creating a convention in the field of human rights, the working name of which is the 'International Legally Binding Instrument on Business and Human Rights'. The author analyses the existing legal grounds for the responsibility of business for human rights violations in international law. She has assessed non-binding instruments, leading her to draw the conclusion that mechanisms strengthening protection are required in human rights protection law. The process of the creation of a new convention itself is subjected to an in-depth review. A special place is given to the issue of the position of a victim of human rights violations committed as a result of the activity of transnational enterprises, the rights of the victims of such violations and the mechanisms of international cooperation in the combatting thereof. In the conclusion the author states that human rights require actions that move beyond existing divisions, and that the work of the intergovernmental group led by Ecuador should be seriously supported by the European Union and the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theorizing about the sharing-protecting tension has been mostly at the organizational level.We draw on advances in self-regulation theory and hot cognition microfoundations of organizational capabilities to articulate three capabilities that dyads of interacting individuals in interorganizational collaborations must possess to regulate the sharingprotecting tension. Besides the recursive influences within dyads, the three capabilities involve recursive multilevel influences between individuals and their home organizations. The interactive self-regulatory theory helps explain how interacting individuals are able to dynamically adjust their sharing and protecting behaviors to the complexity, emergence, and adaptation required in interorganizational collaborations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars have emphasized the potential of self-regulation, realized through 'codes of good governance', to improve gender diversity on boards. Yet, unconvinced of the effectiveness of this self-regulation, many regulators have implemented mandatory quota laws. Our study sheds light on this dilemma. Seeking to broaden our conceptual knowledge of how such 'codes' work in the specific case of gender diversity on boards, we ask: Under which conditions is self-regulation via voluntary principles of good governance effective? Expanding recent institutional-theory perspectives from the literature of women on boards, we show that, in the case of Austria, self-regulation via code recommendations is ineffective unless supported by additional forces. The primary reason for this, we argue, is that nominators do not expect benefits from gender-diverse boards. Furthermore, non-compliant companies face little pressure to change due to the small number of companies that have already adopted respective code recommendations. We identify two potential alternatives to boost the effectiveness of voluntary self-regulation for gender-diverse boards: First, the introduction of concrete targets for female representation and the public monitoring of fulfillment; and, second, the establishment of a credible threat that mandatory quotas will be imposed if diversity goals are not achieved. Drawing on longitudinal data from 2006 to 2016 on listed and state-owned companies in Austria, we give an empirical account of the conditions that assure effective self-regulation. Arguing that codes suffer from what we call 'opportunity bias', we conclude that political goals (such as gender equality) based on ethical rather than instrumental considerations are unlikely to be effectively implemented solely by codes of good governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The widespread access to modern technology devices have provided an alternative medium for bullies to target their victims. The present study tends to look upon this less attended subject of cyberbullying in the workplace. The joint impact of the mediating role of (a) social vulnerability between the perceived cyberbullying severity with employees' behavioral outcomes, and moderating role of (b) self-regulation in influencing the relationship between social vulnerability and behavioral outcomes. Using a field sample of 387 employees working in different organizations. Results were consistent with the hypothesized model, in that social vulnerability mediated the relationship of perceived cyberbullying severity with employee's silence and social withdrawal. However, self-regulation did not moderate the relationship between the links. The results further revealed that perceived cyberbullying severity has a negative indirect effect on employee's social withdrawal. This research offers suggest a need for supervisory training as well as clear corporate policies regarding workplace cyber securities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Credit rating agencies are an important element of the informational financial infrastructure, which is essential for the stability of the financial system. In the absence of conflicts of interest and the importance of the established reputation for the rating agencies, self-regulation is sufficient to guarantee high-accuracy ratings. The payment for ratings by issuers and their use in financial regulations create distorted incentives to pursue higher profits at the expense of the quality of ratings. The demonstrated failures of the rating agencies confirm the need for strict regulations to restore investor confidence in the ratings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the literature on corporate social responsibility (CSR) has discussed the scope and meaning of CSR extensively, confusion still exists regarding how to define the concept. One controversial issue deals with the changing legal status of CSR (i.e., the voluntary vs. mandatory nature of the concept). Based on a review of CSR definitions and meta-studies on CSR definitions, we find that the majority of definitions leans toward voluntary CSR. However, some recent regulatory amendments toward mandatory CSR have called into question the established idea of CSR as merely a managerial tool of self-regulation. In this paper, we juxtapose the evolution of CSR in India against the scholarly literature discussing voluntary-versus-mandatory CSR to understand the recent shift toward a new conceptualization of CSR as a form of co-regulation that includes elements of both voluntary and mandatory regulation. The Indian Companies Act 2013 (Section 135) is a remarkable example in that it replaced an older version from 1956, taking a bold step toward the integration of voluntary and mandatory aspects in the application of CSR. We present practical implications of the Indian case for businesses and discuss implications for CSR theory development; we particularly consider the evolution of the business and society relationship from a voluntary soft law approach to CSR to an increasingly hard law approach and transitory hybrid forms in-between like soft–hard law and hard–soft law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In early 2018, President Trump signed the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA) into law. It was enacted mainly in response to failed civil suits against Backpage.com, a website accused of allowing, and even helping, users to post ads of sex trafficking victims. Plaintiffs, minors with ads for them posted on the website, were almost universally blocked by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA), which granted Backpage immunity for what its users post. FOSTA removes that immunity, as well as amends and adds federal offenses. The law has faced much criticism for going too far, but no one has yet asked if it goes far enough. In other words, would Backpage now lose the suits that could not have been filed before FOSTA? To evaluate the law's impact, this Note reconsiders the infamous Doe v. Backpage case in light of FOSTA. After analyzing the law through analogous statutes and case law, this Note concludes the law is at most ambiguous as to its legal effect. Thus, not only is the law creating negative side effects for speech online and creating danger for sex workers, it may not even be achieving its legal objective. This Note looks at the widespread reaction to FOSTA, the self-regulation of many websites in response, and explores reasons for that reaction, including the law's expressive effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Throughout the United States, accrediting bodies serve as voluntary self-regulating entities designed to ensure accountability and quality assurance at the institutions that seek accreditation. To examine the impact of accreditation on the field of human services, a mixed-method content analysis was utilized. The 50 human services programs accredited by the Council for Standards on Human Services Education (CSHSE) as of July of 2018 were examined. Researchers also employed a triangulated approach to understand these programs through an analysis of Carnegie Classifications, regional accreditation agencies, and institutions’ programmatic websites. Results offer insight into how the CSHSE influences the professional identity of human services thorough: (1) variations in the length of time programs have been accredited; (2) regional distinctions between accredited programs; (3) and the titles of programs accredited by the CSHSE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a globalizing world, governments are not always able or willing to regulate the social and environmental externalities of global business activities. Multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSI), defined as global institutions involving mainly corporations and civil society organizations, are one type of regulatory mechanism that tries to fill this gap by issuing soft law regulation. This conceptual paper examines the conditions of a legitimate transfer of regulatory power from traditional democratic nation-state processes to private regulatory schemes, such as MSIs. Democratic legitimacy is typically concerned with input legitimacy (rule credibility, or the extent to which the regulations are perceived as justified) and output legitimacy (rule effectiveness, or the extent to which the rules effectively solve the issues). In this study, we identify MSI input legitimacy criteria (inclusion, procedural fairness, consensual orientation, and transparency) and those of MSI output legitimacy (rule coverage, efficacy, and enforcement), and discuss their implications for MSI democratic legitimacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstracts are presented in English and French languages for articles in this issue including the titles "Brokerage Industry Self-Regulation: The Case of Analysts' Background Disclosures," "Endogenous Accounting Bias when Decision Making and Control Interact," and "International Evidence on Analyst Stock Recommendations, Valuations, and Returns."

Using data from a sample of U.S. industrial facilities subject to the federal Clean Air Act from 1993 to 2003, this article theorizes and tests the conditions under which organizations' symbolic commitments to self-regulate are particularly likely to result in improved compliance practices and outcomes. We argue that the legal environment, particularly as it is constructed by the enforcement activities of regulators, significantly influences the likelihood that organizations will effectively implement the self-regulatory commitments they symbolically adopt. We investigate how different enforcement tools can foster or undermine organizations' normative motivations to self-regulate. We find that organizations are more likely to follow through on their commitments to self-regulate when they (and their competitors) are subject to heavy regulatory surveillance and when they adopt self-regulation in the absence of an explicit threat of sanctions. We also find that historically poor compliers are significantly less likely to follow through on their commitments to self-regulate, suggesting a substantial limitation on the use of self-regulation as a strategy for reforming struggling organizations. Taken together, these findings suggest that self-regulation can be a useful tool for leveraging the normative motivations of regulated organizations but that it cannot replace traditional deterrence-based enforcement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The literatures of business ethics and international business have generally had little influence on each other. Nevertheless, the decline in the power of nation states, the emergence of non-governmental organizations, the proliferation of self-regulatory bodies, and the changing responsibilities, roles, and structure of multinational corporations make constructive engagement between these two disciplines imperative. This changing institutional landscape creates many areas of common concern. In this article, we describe the changing institutional context of global business and suggest ways in which both business ethics and international business may inform each other more fruitfully. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Little is known about the relationship between industry self-regulation organizations and the diffusion of policy content. Using the organic food industry as a context, this study examines the relationship between local and federated standards-based certification organizations and specific changes in U.S. state laws. The study's findings indicate that local structures correspond to greater legal innovation and elaboration, but less variation. Conversely, federated structures correspond to less legal innovation and elaboration, and greater content variation. These findings both challenge extant theories regarding organizational capacities of local and federated organizations and extend contemporary conceptions of diffusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We extend theories of self-regulation of physical commons to analyze self-regulation of intangible commons in modern industry. We posit that when the action of one firm can cause "spillover" harm to others, firms share a type of commons. We theorize that the need to protect this commons can motivate the formation of a self-regulatory institution. Using data from the U.S. chemical industry, we find that spillover harm from industrial accidents increased after a major industry crisis and decreased following the formation of a new institution. Additionally, our findings suggest that the institution lessened spillovers from participants to the broader industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we examine the effects of different competitive conditions on the determination and evaluation of strategies of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Although the mainstream of current thinking in business ethics recognizes that a firm should invest in social responsibility, the normative theory on how specific competitive conditions affect a firm's social responsibility remains underdeveloped. Intensity of competition, risks to reputation and the regulatory environment determine the competitive conditions of a firm. Our central thesis is that differential strength of competition produces differential moral legitimacy of firm behavior. When competition is fierce or weak, different acts or strategies become morally acceptable, as well as economically rational. A firm has to develop its own strategy of social responsibility, in light of its competitive position, as well as ethical considerations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyzes the determinants of global standardization of multinational companies' environmental policies. Survey data from the chemical industry show that MNCs standardize different environmental policy dimensions in response to pressures from different external stakeholders. MNC characteristics also affect environmental policy standardization. Findings demonstrate that the nature of stakeholder demands affects firms' responses to stakeholder pressures. Because environmental policy standardization reduces MNCs' ability to exploit cross-country differences in environmental regulations, these findings also have important implications for the self-regulation of MNCs' environmental conduct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We develop a classification scheme of systems of exchange using concepts from network analysis, economics, and cultural sociology. This classification illustrates that the "free market" is but one possible type of economy and that other types are not best understood as imperfections. This classification helps to distinguish analytically among qualitatively different types of exchange arrangements and suggests bases from which to develop theories about the organization of markets and exchange systems of various types. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unethical conduct by salespeople contributes to loss to the bottom line directly through misuse of expense reports and indirectly through lost customers who are disenchanted with questionable business practices. Self-regulation by industry has become an important strategy in improving the ethical environment of the industry as well as to establish standards that meet or exceed existing statutory or regulatory requirements. Audits of industry regulatory programs provide a mechanism to uncover weaknesses, heighten awareness of the importance of ethics and allow for improvements to be made and risks reduced. This study audits the Direct Selling Industry's code of ethics as it complies with the Federal Sentencing Guidelines (FSG) and establishes a benchmark against which subsequent ethics research in the Direct Selling Industry can be compared. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, demands from external stakeholders have created pressures for companies to adopt new environmental management practices. Some industries have developed their own non-regulatory codes of environment, health, and safety (EHS) practice. Have these codes generated substantive change in members' actions or do they simply reinforce existing perceptions and practices? This article examines the response of sixteen chemical companies to the first industry-generated EHS code. Responsible Care. In some cases, companies have adopted uniform practices, while in other cases significant variation persists. The adoption and implementation by companies of non-regulatory environmental codes is a poor indicator that any particular standard practices will be followed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article looks at the strategies adopted by the Chinese government to combat corporate corruption. Topics covered include the two elements involved in the Chinese anti-corporate corruption approach that include sovereign investing, the important role played by sovereign wealth funds as instruments of corruption management, and the use of government policies to manage company efforts at corruption self-regulation.

In recent years, significant steps ahead have been taken in Italy to enhance corporate governance standards. The traditional commonplace, describing the Italian system as hostile to investors' activism, is no longer accurate. This paper aims at (re)starting a discussion about the issues of board nomination and the management of dissenting opinions, looking at the current legal and factual framework through the lens of the evolving role of boards of directors and advocating for a larger room for private ordering and self-regulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The normal reaction to market failures is to expect that "regulatory responses" will solve them. However, in addition to regulation, there are several basic and complementary forms of societal control. This paper analyzes and compares these forms of control with particular emphasis on self-regulation as applied to advertising. The true purpose and limitations of advertising self-regulation are emphasized in light of current criticisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Statutory approaches toward whistle-blowing currently appear to be based on the assumption that most observers of wrongdoing will report it unless deterred from doing so by fear of retaliation. Yet our review of research from studies of whistle-blowing behavior suggests that this assumption is unwarranted. We propose that an alternative legislative approach would prove more successful in encouraging valid whistle-blowing and describe a model for such legislation that would increase self-monitoring of ethical behavior by organizations, with obvious benefits to society at large. A defense contractor's inspectors used improper calibration standards when inspecting missile parts and other military products, used noncertified inspectors when inspecting such products, and used employees without top-secret clearance to work on classified projects. This created potentially life-threatening products as well as potential compromises of military secrets. Quality-control officials on the Trans Alaska Pipeline were threatened with physical harm, demoted, and spied on in an effort to force them not to turn in negative reports or report problems. As a result, the likelihood of damaging oil spills due to improperly built and maintained equipment is heightened. A major corporation allegedly initiated an analysis of the cost savings that would result from circumventing or reducing compliance with health, safety and environmental standards. Two officers who objected to this noncompliance cost/benefit analysis were subsequently fired. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses aspects of corporate federalism. Federalism is seen as a means of developing more democratic organizations. Experts say with proper leadership federalism illustrates that it is possible to pursue innovation, self-governance, and autonomy. At the same time corporate federalism is designed to allow firms to enjoy the advantages of effective coordination, economies of scale, and the protection of freedom that pluralism provides. Federalism is intended to diffuse the debate between big versus small business in terms of the essential traits needed for international competitveness.

While business self-regulation is often invoked as an alternative to government regulation, it has never lived up to its promise. This article contends that the "undersupply" of business self-regulation is due to the fact that its benefits typically take the form of public goods. It is notorious that public goods, because they are vulnerable to free-rider problems, are inefficiently supplied by the market. Ironically, then the principal means that we rely on to regulate business–the market–undercuts business's capacity for self-regulation in cases of market failure. Moreover, the extreme fragmentation of business in the U.S. and the barriers we have placed in the way of inter-firm collective action have left us heavily dependent on government to regulate market failures. In other societies, collective action by business, typically administered by a peak organization, has provided an alternative to increased government control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What has been our experience with industry self-regulation-the setting of standards, the policing of deceptive practices, and the grading of products by industry groups in the absence of federal or state regulation? What are its implications for effective public policy? The author reviews a number of examples of industry self-regulation, presents a simple classification scheme to help evaluate the social desirability of the practices that result, and concludes by suggesting that mixed systems combining industry standard setting with government oversight may be the most desirable policy option. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Standards affect the quality and cost of virtually every product and service. Yet the persons who set standards seldom go beyond the technical aspects of their function to consider the economic and social welfare effects of such standards. The consumer should be represented in standards and certification programs; this could be done by the proposed federal consumer protection agency as well as by strengthening the independent action of the National Bureau of Standards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the consumer movement has made significant strides in the past ten years through the efforts of government agencies, consumer organizations, and social activist groups like Ralph Nader's, all that could have been achieved has not been. Instead of continuing with consumer protection as it is, with its regulatory mechanism, judicial process, organized consumer groups, and industry self-regulation, three kinds of balances must be restored between the consumer and the producer: information balance, bargaining power balance, and adjudication and remedy and relief balance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research Summary: Regulatory bodies often wrestle with the thorny question of whether to mandate a governance practice or allow for organic adoption. While mandates afford rapid diffusion, we theorize that they also result in ceremonial adoptions. Leveraging a quasi‐natural experiment, we compare adoption outcomes for a governance practice—lead director adoption—that was mandated by the NYSE but not the NASDAQ. We find that NYSE firms are more likely than NASDAQ firms to have installed a lead director as a symbolic management tactic, so their lead directors are less effectual. We also find that transient institutional investors are deceived by this symbolic management, but dedicated institutional investors are not. Managerial Summary: Shareholders and analysts often desire to see companies introduce strict governance measures, such as proxy access and independent boards. Consequently, regulatory bodies often wrestle with the thorny issue of whether and when to mandate such practices for all companies. What they might not realize is that mandates may not work as well as they seem. Although more companies adopt reform under a mandate, they do so merely as a symbolic gesture. We look at one governance reform—appointing a lead director—finding that companies who introduce this reform as a result of a mandate appoint someone that is relatively toothless. We also find, though, that savvy investors are not actually fooled by this tactic and will trade out of firms that attempt such symbolic management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Current national responses to the monitoring and prevention of alcohol marketing to vulnerable populations, such as youth, typically rely on partial bans, co-regulation and industry self-regulation. Efforts to evaluate compliance with existing regulations are often cumbersome and resource intensive. We sought to develop a short questionnaire to assess compliance of alcohol advertising to existing alcohol industry self-regulated marketing codes. Methods: Questions for the Alcohol Marketing Assessment Rating Tool (AMART) were taken from a longer rating instrument that was originally developed to detect violations of a self-regulated alcohol marketing code. Secondary analysis of data from three studies of alcohol advertisements was performed to determine the reliability and validity of AMART at detecting code violations, using the longer form as the criterion. One sample was used as an exploratory set. Two samples were used to validate the questionnaire. Results: In the exploratory set, the reliability of AMART was considered near perfect (kappa = 0.92). Sensitivity was 97%, and specificity was 100%. Positive predictive value (PPV) was perfect and negative predictive value (NPV) was approximately 90%. In the validation sets, reliability was considered substantial to near perfect (kappa = 0.71–0.94). Specificity and PPV remained perfect, and NPV was 86%–90%. Conclusion: The AMART is a reliable tool to detect violations of a self-regulated marketing code in alcohol advertising. It significantly decreases the amount of resources needed to evaluate a finite number of advertisements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines digital data-driven platforms and their impact on contemporary regulatory paradigms. While these phenomena are increasingly proclaimed as disruptive in many respects, they remain relatively little understood, including in their regulatory dimension. Law-makers around the globe, including the European Commission, are currently trying to make sense of these developments and determine how to regulate digital platforms. In its 2016 Communication on Online Platforms, the European Commission proposed various options for regulating the platform economy, including self-regulatory and co-regulatory models. The Commission's assumption that self-regulation or co-regulation can replace top-down legislative intervention in the platform economy forms the background of this article. It examines these three options and concludes that, given that command-and-control regulation as well as self-regulation raise significant problems in their application to the platform economy, co-regulation emerges as the most adequate option provided that certain conditions are met. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To address substandard working conditions in global value chains, companies have adopted private regulatory systems governing worker rights. Scholars agree that without onsite factory audits, this private regulation has limited impact at the point of production. Companies, however, audit only a subset of their suppliers, severely restricting their private regulatory attempts. Despite the significance of the placement of suppliers inside or outside firms' 'responsibility boundaries' and despite scholars' having called for more research into how firms prioritize what suppliers to audit, few, if any, systematic studies have examined the topic. This is problematic, as the placement of firms' responsibility boundaries determines what suppliers and workers are included in firms' private regulatory attempts. Based on a study of 12 Swedish firms and the theory of moral disengagement, this paper starts to fill this research gap by exploring how firms' responsibility boundaries are placed. The paper illustrates how firms' responsibility boundary placement is best described as a patchwork with firms defining and delimiting their responsibilities differently. The paper also demonstrates that three supplier types (i.e., the worst, morally justified, and immediate suppliers) are particularly likely to be placed inside firms' responsibility boundaries, while a fourth type (i.e., disregarded suppliers) is likely be placed outside. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I develop a model of policy making in complex domains where bureaucrats find it very difficult to establish autonomous sources of expertise, so regulators are highly dependent on the regulated industry and its willingness to engage in selfregulation. In the model, a legislative principal decides whether to delegate the power to an agency to regulate the activities of a firm or industry. The policy domain is complex in that knowledge of the implications of different policy choices is concentrated in the firm. The agency can learn about the policy environment only through monitoring the firm's efforts at self-regulation. The main result is that, as policy becomes more complex, regulatory outcomes are increasingly biased toward those preferred by the firm. Moreover, when the agency has preferences that diverge from the firm's, the firm invests less in its own self-regulatory efforts for fear that its policy investments will be expropriated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We add to the debate on the determinants of firms' green investment strategies (GIS) by looking at societal stakeholders and explicitly testing the role of local environmental non-profit organizations (ENPOs) in GIS engagement by family and non-family firms. We argue that ENPOs favor GIS engagement only by family firms, which, due to their resource constraints, risk aversion and local embeddedness, are more sensitive to ENPOs normative pressure. We also suggest that the role of ENPOs is especially important for family firms' GIS in those sectors with less stringent regulations, where ENPOs may act as a substitute for the coercive pressure of regulation, and promote firms' self-regulatory behaviors. We test and find support for our arguments on a sample of about 2000 Italian manufacturing firms over the period 2001–2003. Our results are robust to the control of observable omitted variables, reverse causality and to alternative model specifications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]