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Despite 2016 legalization of recreational cannabis cultivation and sale in California with the passage of Proposition 64, many cannabis businesses operate without licenses. Furthermore, federal regulations disincentivize financial institutions from banking and lending to licensed cannabis businesses. The authors explore the impact of legal cannabis business activity on California financial institutions, the barriers to banking faced by cannabis businesses, and the nontraditional sources of financing used by the industry.

The authors use a mixed methods approach. The authors utilize call data for banks and credit unions headquartered in California and state cannabis licensing data to estimate the impact of the extensive and intensive margins of licensed cannabis activity on key banking indicators using difference-and-difference and fixed effects regressions. The qualitative data come from interviews with industry stakeholders in northern California's “Emerald Triangle” and add important context.

The quantitative results show economically and statistically significant impacts of licensed cannabis activity on banking indicators, suggesting both direct and spillover effects from cannabis activity to the financial sector. However, cannabis businesses report substantial barriers to accessing basic financial services and credit, leading to nontraditional financing arrangements.

The results suggest opportunities for cannabis businesses and financial institutions if regulations are eased and important avenues for further study.

The authors contribute to the nascent literature on cannabis economics and the literature on banking regulation and nontraditional finance.

The purpose of this paper is to supply basic insights into the principle of shūrā (consultation) in Islamic banking, the idea of a centralised approach to the corporate governance of Islamic financial institutions (IFIs), the roles of a centralised Sharīʿah board as the highest authority on Sharīʿah issues and its distinguishing features from a de-centralised system and the advantages and disadvantages of the two governance systems.

In analyzing these, the paper adopts the critical legal studies approach and refers to the provisions of the Qurʾan and Sunnah, ijmāʿ (consensus) of Sharīʿah scholars and recent Islamic banking reports.

Despite the fact that the double-digit growth of the current US$2tn Islamic banking industry is a promising sign for its further expansion – expecting to cross the US$6.5tn mark by 2020 – there remains concern over the lack of standardization or rather the diversified approaches to the corporate governance of IFIs across key Islamic banking regions.

There has been much debate surrounding the issue of whether the Islamic banking industry requires a centralised Sharīʿah board at the state level to complement the Sharīʿah boards at the IFIs’ individual level in providing better supervision of the Sharīʿah-compliance of IFIs. The fact that the industry is already equipped with two prominent standard-setting agencies in the form of the AAOIFI, the IFSB does little to suggest that best governance practices – which centre around the themes of consistency, harmony and uniformity – are on the horizon, at least not whilst their issued standards and guidelines remain voluntary for IFIs.

All in all, it is aspired that this paper may assist the reader in evaluating the pros and cons of the whole concept of Sharīʿah board centralisation.

Accounting practices vary not only across firms, but also across countries, reflecting the respective legal and cultural background. Attempts at harmonization therefore continue to be rebuffed. The purpose of this paper is to argue that different wordings in national laws, and different interpretations of similar wordings in national laws, can be explained by taking recourse to the philosophy of language, referring particularly to Searle and Wittgenstein.

The example of the substance over form principle, investigated in seven countries, is particularly suitable for this analysis. It is known in all accounting jurisdictions, but still has very different roots in different European countries, with European and international influences conflicting, which is reflected in the different wording of the principle from one country to the next, and the different socially constructed realities associated with those wordings.

This paper shows that, beyond accounting practices, the legal and cultural background of a country affects the wording of national law itself. The broad conclusion is that different socially constructed realities might tend to resist any attempt at harmonized socially constructed words.

The paper contributes to the debate surrounding the possible homogenization of accounting regulations, illustrating the theory of the social construction of both “reality” and “language” on the specific application of one common principle to various Member State environments.

Cross-country studies have shown that higher costs to starting a business tend to reduce entrepreneurship (Chambers and Munemo, 2019) and that an unfavorable environment for business can increase poverty and income inequality (Chambers et al., 2019a; Djankov et al., 2018). Building on the current literature, the authors test whether barriers to starting a business at the state and city level in the USA are associated with changes in entrepreneurship and income inequality.

Measures of entrepreneurship (establishment entry rate and exit rate) are regressed on measures of barriers to entry in a cross-section of 50 states as well as a cross-section of 73 cities in the USA. Further, the authors regress measures of income inequality on measures of barriers to entry using the same two cross-sections. State level data on barriers to entry are from Teague (2016), published in the Journal of Entrepreneurship and Public Policy. City level data on barriers to starting a business are from the Doing Business in North America (DBNA) dataset.

Results show that there is a negative and significant association between barriers to starting a business and the rate of firm exit. A standard deviation increase in barriers to entry is associated with a five percent decrease in the firm exit rate at the state level. The authors find only limited evidence that barriers to entry are associated with income inequality.

Despite a large volume of scholarship on how regulation and barriers to entry influence entrepreneurship, no study (to the authors’ knowledge) has investigated how general entry regulation affects the entry or exit rate of establishments at the state or municipal level in the USA.

This paper analyzes two external costs often associated with port development, cost to fisheries from marine dredge disposal and damages from air pollution, using estimates of development and operation for a proposed (but since cancelled) container port as a case study. For dredge disposal, a bio-economic model was used to assess short- and long-term and indirect (joodweb) damages to fisheries from marine disposal of clean sediments. In the case of air pollution, estimates of annual activity levels and emission coefficients are used to estimate incremental annual emissions of three key pollutants (NOx, HC and CO) for trucks, trains, yard vehicles, and vessels. These estimates allow for phasing in of strict new air pollution regulations. For both external costs, sensitivity analyses are used to reflect uncertainty. Estimates of shadow values in year 2002 dollars amount from $0.094 per cubic yard to $0.169 per cubic yard of clean dredged material for the selected disposal site and from $0.0584 per mile (jor current control standards) to $ 0. 0023 per mile (after phasing in of new regulations) for air pollution from heavy trucks.

In recent times the government has emerged as an enabling and empowering facilitator promoting the adoption of corporate social responsibility (CSR) by businesses to leverage economic competitiveness and growth. India provides a unique context to explore the mandated role of government in relation to CSR specifically within the context of understanding its effective use to resolve grand challenges which the country is facing at present. Grand challenges are complex social, economic and environmental problems which require innovative and collaborative solutions. In this chapter we explore extant secondary data, related to CSR and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to examine whether mandatory CSR implementation which has been unfolding in India over the last few years has been effective in addressing India's grand challenges. Specifically, it focuses on the role of the Indian government, at the national and state levels, in directing CSR activities towards the SDGs.

In Mexico, only 19.3 per cent of industrial water is treated (Green-Peace, 2014, pp. 3-4), whereas municipal treatment levels are approximately 50 per cent (CONAGUA, 2014a). This paper aims to focus on how the wastewater treatment plant policy, from a circular economy perspective, is affected by the governance context at the Presa Guadalupe sub-basin. Circular economy can contribute to water innovations that help in improving water quality. However, such benefits are not easily achieved. This case provides an example of the complexity and challenges that the implementation of a circular economy model can face.

Data are collected via semi-structured in-depth interviews with the stakeholders that are members of the Presa Guadalupe Commission. The contextual interaction theory (CIT) is the theoretical basis for this analysis (Boer de and Bressers, 2011; Bressers, 2009).

The findings show that the wastewater treatment plant policy plays an important role in a circular economy model. Some incentives towards a circular economy model are already in place; however, the hurdles of a top-down implementation perspective, low availability of resources, prioritisation of short-term results, lack of enforcement of the “polluter pays” principle and a linear model of water systems need to be overcome. If Mexico wants to move towards a circular economy model and if the government wants to enforce sustainable development principles, wastewater treatment is a challenge that must be addressed.

There are few studies in the circular economy literature that have analysed its implementation under a governance arrangement perspective.

Based on the hypothesis of the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC), the purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between environmental pollutants (as measured by CO₂ emissions) and GDP for India, over the period 1980–2012. The presence of an inverted “U” shape relationship is examined while controlling for factors such as the degree of trade openness, foreign direct investment, oil prices, the legal system and industrialization.

To verify whether the EKC follows a linear, quadratic or polynomial form, autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach for cointegration with structural breaks is adopted. The annual time series data for carbon emissions (CO₂), economic growth (GDP), industrial development (industrialization), foreign direct investment and trade openness have been obtained from World Development Indicators online database. Crude oil price (international price index) for the period is collected from the International Monetary Fund. Data for total petroleum consumption are collected from the US Energy Information Agency. Data for economic freedom variables are from the Fraser Institute's Economic Freedom Index's online database.

The findings support the existence of inverted U-shaped EKC in the short-run, but not in the long-run. A linear monotonic relationship has also been estimated in select model specifications. Additionally, trade openness has been estimated to reduce emissions in models, which incorporate FDI. Else, where significant, its impact on carbon emissions is adverse. A rise in fuel price leads to reduction in carbon emissions across model specifications. Further, the lower size of government degrades the environment both in the long-run and short-run.

Given the existence of the pollution haven hypothesis, wherein more trade and foreign direct investments cause environmental degradation, the paper proposes formulation of appropriate regulatory mechanisms that are environmentally friendly. Additionally, India's new economic policies, favoring liberalization, privatization and globalization, reinforces the need to strengthen environmental regulations.

Incorporation of economic freedom as measured by the “Size of Government” in the EKC model is unique. “Size of Government” deserves a special mention. The rationale for including this explanatory variable is to understand whether countries with lower government size are more polluting. After all, theory does suggest that goods and services, which have higher social cost vis-à-vis private cost, shall be overproduced in economies that adopt more market-friendly policies, necessitating government intervention. In the study, size of government is measured as per the definition and methodology adopted by Fraser Institute's Economic Freedom of the World Index.

Money laundering continues to emerge as a transnational phenomenon that has harmful consequences for the global economy and society. Despite the theoretical and practical magnitude of money laundering, international business (IB) research on the topic is scarce and scattered across multiple disciplines. Accordingly, this study aims to advance an integrated understanding of money laundering from the IB perspective.

The authors conduct a systematic review of relevant literature and qualitatively analyze the content of 57 studies published on the topic during the past two decades.

The authors identify five streams (5Cs) of research on money laundering in the IB context: the concept, characteristics, causes, consequences and controls. The analysis further indicates six theoretical approaches used in the past research. Notably, normative standards and business and economics theories are dominant in the extant research.

The authors review the literature on an under-researched but practically significant phenomenon and found potential for advancing its theoretical foundations. Hence, the authors propose a 5Cs framework and a future agenda for research and practice by introducing 21 future research questions and two plausible theories to help study the phenomenon more effectively in the future.

In practical terms, the study extends the understanding of the money laundering phenomenon and subsequently helps mitigating the problem of money laundering in the IB environment, along with its harmful economic and societal impacts.

The authors offer an integrative view on money laundering in the IB context. Additionally, the authors emphasize wider discussions on money laundering as a form of mega-corruption.