The impact of national culture on the adoption of environmental management standards: The worldwide diffusion of ISO 14001
Cross Cultural & Strategic Management
ISSN: 2059-5794
Article publication date: 17 October 2019
Issue publication date: 22 November 2019
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore how national cultures contribute to explain the uneven diffusion of ISO 14001 across countries. The paper focuses on two of the cultural dimensions developed by the global leadership and organizational behavior effectiveness (GLOBE) project, namely, performance orientation and institutional collectivism.
Design/methodology/approach
A database containing information about the diffusion of ISO 14001 in 52 countries during the period 1999–2016 was built to carry out this research. The countries considered in this study represent about 90 percent of worldwide ISO 14001 certifications. The information was gathered from publicly available data sources: the ISO Survey, published every year by the International Organization for Standardization, the world development indicators of the World Bank, the cultural dimensions of the GLOBE project and the Index of Economic Freedom provided by The Heritage Foundation.
Findings
This research finds that both performance orientation and institutional collectivism influence the diffusion of ISO 14001. Whereas performance orientation slows down the diffusion of ISO 14001, institutional collectivism speeds it up. Additionally, this research shows that the slowing effect of performance orientation decreases in strength over time, while the accelerating effect of institutional collectivism becomes stronger.
Originality/value
The study adds to the understanding of the influence of national culture on the diffusion of environmental management standards, with an emphasis on ISO 14001. A key contribution of this research is that it explores how the influence of cultural dimensions change over time as a result of the development and maturation of ISO 14001.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful for helpful comments from the editor and an anonymous reviewer. The authors are also grateful to Jaime Gomez for comments on earlier versions of this paper. The authors acknowledge financial aid from the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness and FEDER (Projects ECO2017-85451-R).
Citation
Orcos, R. and Palomas, S. (2019), "The impact of national culture on the adoption of environmental management standards: The worldwide diffusion of ISO 14001", Cross Cultural & Strategic Management, Vol. 26 No. 4, pp. 546-566. https://doi.org/10.1108/CCSM-10-2018-0168
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2019, Emerald Publishing Limited