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This paper aims to examine the effect of ownership structure and board gender diversity on charitable donations for a group of listed electronics companies in Taiwan.

Using linear regression analysis, this paper analyses the ownership structure, board gender diversity and charitable donations of 380 Taiwanese electronics companies (2011-2013).

While domestic institutional investors, such as domestic mutual funds and corporate investors, take more of agency logic view, it negatively impacts on charitable donations. However, the empirical findings of this paper indicate that board gender diversity with the critical number of female directors was positively related to charitable donation. Thus, it is clear that female directors reaching critical numbers were taking more of a stakeholder view of institutional logic, emphasizing the balance of interests of internal and external stakeholders.

This paper is limited to selected Taiwanese electronics companies over a two-year time frame, and charitable donations are the only proxy of corporate social responsibility (CSR) activity. The paper suggests that, as predicted by stakeholder theory and critical mass theory, companies with boards composed of at least three female directors make higher charitable donations.

This paper indicates that female directors on the board should have more voices on the board regarding the necessity and importance of CSR.

The paper contributes to existing literature by looking into the effects of ownership structure and board gender diversity on charitable donations.

Country of origin has profound effects on consumer behavior; yet few studies have examined an antecedent of these effects: why some countries enjoy a positive image while others suffer a negative one. Developing an institutional theory of country image, the authors argue that weak legal institutions at the country level increase firm opportunistic behavior that expropriates consumers and decrease the product quality of local brands, thus decreasing the country’s image regarding its products and brands.

This study measures country image for products and brands using the number of valuable brands (i.e. brands included in the top 500 brands from 2008 to 2016) in a particular home country. Data concerning the rule of law in each country come from the World Bank, and data on the efficiency of countries’ judicial systems comes from Djankov et al. (2007). We also collect patent data from the US Patent and Trade Office, national culture from Hofstede Insights and GDP and GDP per capita from the World Bank as control variables. Panel Poisson regression, Tobit regression and truncated regression are used in the analyses.

Supporting the institutional theory of country image, both the rule of law and efficiency of the judicial systems show positive and significant effects on country image, even when economy size (GDP), degree of economic development (GDP per capita), level of technology and skill (patents) and culture are controlled.

To improve their country’s image and the brand value of local firms, policymakers should strive to strengthen legal institutions aimed at punishing firm opportunistic behavior in their countries.

Previous research on the country-of-origin effect has not yet appreciated the role of legal institutions in developing the construct of country image.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of the salient task environment on reverse logistics (RL) practices and organizational performance in the context of Taiwanese computer, communication, and consumer (3C) electronics retail industry.

A hierarchical regression analysis was employed to test relationships between four constituents of the task environment and RL, as well as relationships between RL and environmental/economic performance. In addition, a regression analysis was used to examine the mediating effect of RL on relationships between the constituents of the task environment and environmental/economic performance. Data and information collected from a sample of 284 companies from the Taiwanese 3C retail industry were used for analysis.

Results suggest that three out of four constituents of task environment including government agencies, suppliers, and customers are associated positively with RL activities. In other words, as the salience of the constituents of the task environment increases, their level of influence on the firm’s RL also increases. This study also found the mediating effect of RL, indicating that superior performance emerges when a company’s RL matches the salient task environment.

The findings provide an insight into the relationships between the constituents of the task environment, RL, and environmental/economic performance which can assist firms within 3C retail industry in designing and developing appropriate strategy for RL. In practice, some retailers, especially SMEs, have outsourced their RL to professional recyclers. Investment in RL activity may be an option for some 3C retailers.

While previous research provides a strong foundation to further develop RL and subsequent policies, analysis of the factors affecting the decision processes to implement RL specially in the retail sector is scarce. This study fills this gap.

This study aims to understand whether board diversity has a direct effect on “corporate social responsibility (CSR)” performance of companies or not. In addition, this study also aims to examine the moderation effect of age and education level of female board members on the relationship between board gender diversity and CSR performance.

A “corporate social performance (CSP)” measurement instrument was designed to conduct a content analysis that analyzes the CSR disclosure in the annual reports of Turkish companies listed on the “500 biggest Turkish companies” report of “Istanbul Chamber of Industry (ISO)” in 2015. The data coming from content analysis of 117 company reports were analyzed by using hierarchical regression analysis.

Despite of supporting the increase in CSR performance when there is a greater presence of independent board members in an organization, evidence supports that ratios of female and foreign board members do not have any significant effect on CSR performance.

The study contributes to previous literature on board diversity and CSR performance as follows. First, this paper contributes to previous literature by examining and testing independent, female and foreign board members as a new antecedent of CSR performance in research on Turkey; second, by examining a sample of the “500 biggest Turkish companies” and providing some tips about both Turkey and other developing countries; third, by reopening the debate about the positive impact of a greater presence of independent directors on board on CSR performance and the non-effect of female and foreign board members. Finally, it also offers a partially new CSP measurement instrument based on content analysis.