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1 – 10 of over 30000This paper aims to propose a legal characterisation of the recent proliferation, across the broad range of global environmental good governance initiatives and practices, of a…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to propose a legal characterisation of the recent proliferation, across the broad range of global environmental good governance initiatives and practices, of a diverse mix of regulatory environmental standards, many of which are informal in origin insofar as they are neither State-driven nor State-centred. It examines the novel conception of legal order posited by Twinning and Walker, to determine whether it encompasses the myriad rules and standards emerging in the field of environmental governance.
Design/methodology/approach
Surveying the rapidly developing montage of formal and informal rules and standards associated with global environmental governance, this paper uses the analytical framework provided by scholars of “global administrative law” to reconcile the complementary roles of formal and informal sources of legal rules, and to explain their increasing convergence around a set of good governance principles and standards commonly used in national administrative law systems.
Findings
The paper concludes that the emerging regulatory framework for global environmental governance comprises an almost endless variety of forms of novel transnational regulatory activity, many succeeding in having a profound impact on environmental outcomes. Yet all appear to be founded upon and guided by a discrete set of good governance standards and principles of an administrative law character – including transparency, participation, legality, rationality, proportionality, reviewability and accountability – which serve to enhance the credibility and legitimacy of each regulatory mechanism.
Research limitations/implications
It appears that new and informal forms of environmental regulatory activity enjoy a complex symbiotic relationship with formal systems of environmental law. In addition to filling lacunae and addressing deficiencies in such systems, owing, for example, to the transnational character of much of today’s trade, informal regulatory systems are increasingly influencing the evolution of formal legal frameworks and, in so doing, are improving the responsiveness, flexibility and accessibility of this new environmental “legal order”.
Practical implications
At a practical level, viewing the wide range of new forms of environmental regulatory activity through the prism of global administrative law (or global environmental law) brings unity to this diverse field and, in so doing, makes available to all the actors involved in this “community of practice” a wealth of established practice and principle which can help to inform the elaboration and interpretation of rules and standards of environmental governance through a process of cross fertilisation of ideas and approaches.
Social implications
Recognition of the legal character and significant role of the wide range of novel forms of environmental regulatory activity lends further credibility and legitimacy to such mechanisms, which often comprise the only truly relevant and applicable environmental controls or truly accessible mode of redress and accountability. The challenges of realising sustainability are immense and, as one leading commentator has noted, “all normative means are useful to this end”.
Originality/value
This paper attempts to characterise the legal nature of the range of novel forms of environmental regulation which (can) play such an important role in modifying the behaviour of many of the key environmental actors globally – actors who have largely been unaffected by more formal legal frameworks. For this reason, it seeks to encourage a fundamental shift in the way we think about environmental law and legal authority.
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The purpose of this article is to discuss the role that law plays for corporate social responsibility (CSR) in substance, action and reporting, including whether CSR functions as…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this article is to discuss the role that law plays for corporate social responsibility (CSR) in substance, action and reporting, including whether CSR functions as informal law.
Design/methodology/approach
The theoretical point of departure is based in legal science. Through a discussion of various contexts of CSR in which law and legal standards feature, the article questions the conception that CSR is to do “more than the law requires”. CSR is discussed with the triple bottom line as a point of departure, focussing on social (esp. labour and human rights) and environmental dimensions.
Findings
It is argued that CSR functions as informal law, and that important principles of law function as part of a general set of values that guide much action on CSR. Furthermore, it is argued that aspects of law in the abstract as well as in the statutory sense and as self‐regulation influence the substance, implementation and communication of CSR, and that the current normative regime of CSR in terms of demands on multinational corporations may constitute pre‐formal law.
Originality/value
Through its discussion, observations and examples of the role played in CSR by law in the abstract as well as the statutory sense, by international, supranational and national soft and hard law and documents, and by public regulation as well as corporate self‐regulation, the paper is of value to corporate managers, public regulators, NGOs and individuals with an interest in CSR, including as an aspect of corporate governance.
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Aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoints practical implications from cutting‐edge research and case studies.
Abstract
Purpose
Aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoints practical implications from cutting‐edge research and case studies.
Design/methodology/approach
This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.
Findings
Multi‐national corporations have often been stereotyped in the popular media and entertainment industries because of their perceived indifference to, and abuse of, basic human rights and corruption. However, as Karin Buhmann points out in her article, “Corporate social responsibility: what role for law? Some aspects of law and CSR”, the reality is much different. Buhmann examines the motivations and driving forces behind corporate social responsibility (CSR), articulating in the process how corporations are held to internal and external standards of practice where the law does not necessarily regulate their behavior.
Practical implications
Provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world's leading organizations.
Originality/value
The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy‐to‐digest format.
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Back in 2005 lawyers for the Milwaukee school board decided to exclude Viagra and similar erectile dysfunction (ED) drugs from health coverage for the teachers’ union because…
Abstract
Back in 2005 lawyers for the Milwaukee school board decided to exclude Viagra and similar erectile dysfunction (ED) drugs from health coverage for the teachers’ union because, well, they were simply too expensive.1 And besides, so the school board explained, such drugs are used primarily for recreational sex and are not a medical necessity.
The purpose of the paper is to question the false dilemma of bread (the social and economic rights) or freedom (the civil and political rights), which amounts to a simplified…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of the paper is to question the false dilemma of bread (the social and economic rights) or freedom (the civil and political rights), which amounts to a simplified ambivalent vision either for or against “China in Africa”, in the debate over African workers’ rights in Chinese enterprises. The paper, first underscores the importance of the constraining and enabling institutional conditions by deconstructing this normative approach, and then proposes an alternative institutional approach to address issues pertaining to employment relations.
Design/methodology/approach
In the tradition of deconstructive techniques, the paper draws three lines of institutional resistance to move the “China in Africa” controversy in employment relations beyond its normative approach. These lines of demarcation are an African ethnology as opposed to a Western modernist reference, a postcolonial analysis of power in lieu of liberal hegemony and informality as a legitimate source of legality.
Findings
The paper suggests the Chinese corporate strategy as implemented by managers notably through human resource management practices, the African institutional contexts where the protagonists’ power resources are deployed and the paramount importance of informality in discussing the impacts of Chinese investments on workers’ rights in sub-Saharan Africa.
Originality/value
The paper shows that the disconnect between “good investment” that should improve social and economic rights and “bad employment” that downplays civil and political rights is not a “foreign” (Western or Chinese) issue per se, but a challenge for innovative employment relations that support investment and mind the workplace institutional context.
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Clare M. Mouat, Erika Jane Edith Techera, Lies Notebaert, Meredith Blake and Renae Barker
Humanity has a weakness in how we approach the “challenge” of using outer space. This paper aims to show how the global and national frameworks that address our planetary…
Abstract
Purpose
Humanity has a weakness in how we approach the “challenge” of using outer space. This paper aims to show how the global and national frameworks that address our planetary activities and crises are inadequate for the opportunities and challenges of life in outer space.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors draw on multidisciplinary perspectives to refine an organising governance framework that better showcases the challenges and pathways needed for living and thriving in space-age. The authors prioritise two key pillars and overview the practical and social implications that space-age humanity must address.
Findings
Social sciences and humanities are vital to problematising post-war colonial legacies of governance by distinguishing the unique and overlooked challenges for thriving and working offworld and identifying progressive research agendas.
Research limitations/implications
The highlighted agenda has implications for collaborative research institutes and project design. As the vital basis for continuous learning, university-based research institutes span bodies of knowledge, experience, convention and imagination that can support vibrant and overdue debate on good governance that is out of this world.
Practical implications
This expansive approach has practical implications for the decision-making processes and subjects of spacescape, from reconciling the space commons with prospecting and human occupation to potential governance regimes that capitalise on the zeal for moving beyond merely “existing” off-world.
Social implications
Examining the governance deficit as we pursue developing spacescape frontiers is an enriching (not reductionist) agenda that deliberately troubles the existing and emerging regime for governing our scientific and imagined off-world society.
Originality/value
This framework appeals to humanity’s highest evolution in co-producing a fair and flourishing off-world governance framework (beyond replicating planetary regimes).
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States that the financial services industry application of mainstream strategy literature gives ample consideration to an organization’s task and technical environment. Points…
Abstract
States that the financial services industry application of mainstream strategy literature gives ample consideration to an organization’s task and technical environment. Points out, however, that this level of analysis does not deal explicitly with the larger “institutional” context, within which an organization is embedded. Using the Canadian banking industry as an exemplar of a highly institutionalized financial services industry, demonstrates the utility of institutional theory in understanding the origins, nature and dynamics of powerful institutional pressures of conformity. Calls this conformist strategy “mismanagement”.
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Edith O. Nwosu, Collins C. Ajibo, Uchechukwu Nwoke and Ikenna Okoli
The purpose of the paper is to explore the legal and institutional frameworks for optimal regulation of capital market beyond compliance-based regulation, to enable the market to…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of the paper is to explore the legal and institutional frameworks for optimal regulation of capital market beyond compliance-based regulation, to enable the market to deliver on its strategic role as the enabler of efficient allocation of resources and economic growth.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper relies on doctrinal approach to assess the existing regulatory approaches and prospects for the future.
Findings
The paper found that the regulatory authorities unduly concentrate on compliance-based and sanction-based regimes without sufficient emphasis on innovations and transformative solutions that foster diversification and efficiency in the market. The paper also found that the deployment of innovations and transformative solutions complemented with robust regulation is positively correlated with capital market growth.
Originality/value
The paper offers fresh insights on the optimal approaches to regulation of capital market that transcend compliance-based and sanction-based regimes to reliance on innovative tools that expand, diversify and effectuate the functionality and utility of capital market.
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