Voluntary environmental collaborations and corporate social responsibility in Siem Reap city, Cambodia

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to identify which actors play leadership and brokerage roles in voluntary environmental collaborations and how the corporate social responsibility (CSR) of actors is associated with such voluntary networking behaviours in Cambodia.

Design/methodology/approach

To achieve these purposes, this study mainly uses social network analysis to capture the properties of networking behaviours in the voluntary collaborative activities underlying three main environmental issues: waste disposal, energy and water pollution. The study focusses on the collaborative efforts undertaken by actors across multiple sectors: governmental organizations, for-profits and civil society organizations.

Findings

The results show that the government plays the leading role in voluntary environmental collaborations across environmental issues; however, the actual implementation is expanded to be undertaken by non-state actors. Moreover, CSR has positive associations with networking and brokerage roles; therefore, this study reveals the utility of various voluntary policy instruments.

Practical implications

This study demonstrates the role of governmental initiation and its influence on non-state actors, even for voluntary environmental tools. The CSR initiatives of private actors can also be supported and encouraged by the government, which will promote participation by private actors in voluntary collaborative networks and their leading role as network facilitators.

Social implications

By understanding the positions and roles of each actor in the environmental collaborative networks, environmental policymakers can better understand the possibilities and the capabilities of each actor both to improve policy design and learning and to respond to policy changes effectively.

Originality/value

Voluntary collaboration and CSR are non-regulated policy tools; however, they can be promoted and introduced into society by governmental organizations, and they affect each other.

Citation

Vitiea, K. and Lim, S. (2019), "Voluntary environmental collaborations and corporate social responsibility in Siem Reap city, Cambodia", Sustainability Accounting, Management and Policy Journal, Vol. 10 No. 3, pp. 451-475. https://doi.org/10.1108/SAMPJ-04-2018-0118