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Analyzing the 2004 U.S. General Social Survey and Korean General Social Survey, this chapter attempts to show that even similar climates of associationalism in two countries can lead to differential consequences for participatory democracy, depending on the associations’ capacities to foster civic resources. This chapter first examines whether the politically desirable traits of civic virtue and social trust essential to political participation can be developed by associational membership in the United States and Korea. Second, it investigates whether associational membership strengthens, weakens, or leaves unchanged the effects of socioeconomic resources measured by educational attainment and family income on political participation especially among association members in these two countries. The results indicate that voluntary associations in the United States, compared to those in Korea, do a better job of playing the role of civic educator and even of political equalizer. First, associational membership significantly and positively affects civic virtue and social trust in the United States. Second, associational membership does not affect civic virtue and social trust in Korea. Third, the effects of educational attainment and family income on political participation among members are weak in the United States. Fourth, the effects of educational attainment and family income on political participation among members are strong in Korea. Therefore, this chapter concludes that voluntary associations do not contribute to participatory equality in Korea despite its vibrant group-centered culture, whereas their American counterparts are relatively effective in bringing about the expected outcome.

Prior to widespread social insurance, European governments experimented with a variety of programs to protect workers from income loss due to illness. This paper examines the consequences for worker absenteeism of making sickness insurance coverage voluntary or compulsory. Medical benefits appear to have reduced absenteeism for all workers. The effect of paid sick leave depended on insurance fund membership status. Better-paid workers found it easier to take time off in compulsory than in voluntary funds. Distinctive information problems plagued voluntary systems, and eventually were resolved by rejecting the voluntary ideal and forcing all workers into a single risk pool.

Purpose – To analyze the emergence of new organizational forms in the Danish welfare sector.

Design/methodology/approach – Drawing on Niklas Luhmann and Gunther Teubner, the research analyzes governmental documents, policy programs, action plans, and strategic documents.

Findings – A partnering structure has emerged with a new politics of voluntarism, complex forms of integration and new imaginary distinctions between voluntariness and public care. This can usefully be conceptualized as aspects of the stabilization of a “third-order system.” The research identified a number of different managerial strategies for involvement in the system.

Practical and social implications – Social welfare has become a mix of public and civil society values and norms, and extensive resources have been invested from both governmental and nongovernmental sides to build up shared competences for the new forms of partnering-based organization. However, to act according to the new principles of partnering, at the strategic and managerial level, the voluntary organizations have to behave in a schizophrenic manner – as both individual organizations and cooperational partners within the system.

Research implications – The concept of “third-order system” is especially useful in analyzing mixed forms of management in the welfare sector.

Originality – Different forms of radical organizational analysis are combined to develop a notion of “third-order system” in the welfare sector.

Existing reviews of research on voluntary childlessness generally take the form of narrative summaries, focusing on main topics investigated over time. In this chapter, the authors extend previous literature reviews to conduct a systematic review and content analysis of socio-historical and geopolitical aspects of knowledge production about voluntary childlessness. The dataset comprised 195 peer-reviewed articles that were coded and analysed to explore, inter alia: the main topic under investigation; country location of authors; sample characteristics; theoretical framework and methodology. The findings are discussed in relation to the socio-historical contexts of knowledge production, drawing on theoretical insights concerned with the politics of location, representation and research practice. The shifts in the topics of research from the 1970s, when substantial research first emerged, uphold the view of voluntary childlessness as non-normative. With some regional variation, knowledge is dominated by quantitative, hard science methodologies and mostly generated about privileged, married women living in the global North. The implications of this for future research concerned with reproductive freedom are outlined.

In recent years, there has been a growing trend of individuals willingly opting for employment positions that do not fully use their education, skills and abilities, a phenomenon known as voluntary overqualification. This study aims to investigate the factors that influence and the formation mechanism of this emerging phenomenon. Drawing upon social cognition theory, this study explores the relationship between work values and voluntary overqualification while also examining the mediating role of the future work self and the moderating role of perceived marketability.

This study used a longitudinal approach, collecting data through questionnaires administered at multiple time points. The sample consisted of 607 employees from various departments of five Chinese companies. Regression analysis using the PROCESS macro in SPSS was used to test the research hypotheses.

The results indicate a positive relationship between employees’ work values and voluntary overqualification. Furthermore, this relationship is mediated by the future work self. Additionally, perceived marketability plays a moderating intermediary role in the whole model.

This study contributes to the overqualification literature by introducing a novel type of overqualification and unveiling the mechanism by which work values influence voluntary overqualification. The findings provide insights for understanding and managing employees who are voluntarily overqualified.

We investigate outcomes associated with the turnover of unskilled workers, isolating its effects on revenue, cost, and profit. Little attention from researchers has been given to unskilled workers, a significant portion of the workforce.

This study investigates the relation between turnover among unskilled workers and financial performance using data from 527 hotels owned by the same lodging chain. The workers in our sample are full-time housekeepers and front desk attendants.

We find that the relation between turnover and performance differs by turnover type (voluntary vs. involuntary) and category of unskilled worker, reiterating the need to differentiate between turnover type and the importance of context in studying turnover. We challenge the assumption that voluntary turnover is categorically harmful and our results for front desk attendants support the view that organizations choose turnover levels that maximize performance. We also provide new evidence on the effects of involuntary turnover. Contrary to the established notion that dismissing less able employees should improve performance, we find that involuntary turnover has negative consequences.

Our results demonstrate the importance of distinguishing voluntary turnover from involuntary turnover and the need to include both in models predicting turnover’s performance effects.

The aim of this study was to examine the moderating roles of the legitimate power and distributive justice of the tax authority on the effect of procedural justice on the voluntary tax compliance of taxpayers in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, by using survey data collected from taxpayers in the city.

Data for the study were collected from 800 sample taxpayers who were drawn by using a systematic sampling technique. The variables of the study were constructed as indices from composing the scale items developed and tested for their validity by prior researchers. Having collected the data by using a 7-point Likert scale questionnaire and forming the latent variables, hierarchical multiple regressions were applied to determine the moderating effects of the two variables (i.e. legitimate power and distributive justice) on the effect of procedural justice on voluntary tax compliance.

The author found that both the legitimate power of the tax authority and distributive justice of the authority moderate the effect of procedural justice on voluntary tax compliance. The moderating roles of the two variables appear to be opposite in that low (but not high) distributive justice and high (but not low) legitimate power of the tax authority stimulate the effect of procedural justice on voluntary tax compliance.

The first limitation is that the data used in this study are self-reported data while the subject of the study is sensitive subject about which respondents are not believed to provide genuine responses. This is presumably because taxpayers are less likely to confess their tax evasion as they fear legal actions following their self-report. Hence, other controlled methods such as the experimental design are recommended to replicate the results of this study. The second limitation is that data for the study were gathered through a one-time cross-sectional survey and hence it would not warrant a causal claim between the study variables. Consequently, other research with a longitudinal or experimental design might warrant a causal relationship between the variables.

Therefore, the tax authorities must endeavor to attain high legitimacy by doing “the right things” as perceived by the taxpayers so that their tax-related decisions gain acceptance from the decision recipients. Tax policy makers as well ought to consider the importance of and the relationship between procedural justice, distributive justice and legitimate power of the tax authority in order to attain the maximum possible voluntary compliance of taxpayers that significantly reduces the administrative cost of taxes.

The study benefits society by enhancing tax compliance and hence helping the government secure a better amount of tax revenue and provide better public goods and services.

The findings of this study are of high theoretical and policy significance. Theoretically, the findings contribute to the integrative literature on economic deterrence and social-psychological factors that are responsible for voluntary tax compliance decisions. The parallel moderating roles of the two variables on the relationship between procedural justice and voluntary cooperation in a single model and in the tax compliance context are novel. In terms of applicability to policy formulations, they shed light on the need for a shift from a pure focus on aggressive tax audits and penalties, especially in emerging economies to a combination of the tax audits and the nurturing of the voluntary deference of taxpayers to the tax authority's decisions. Caution must, however, be taken that the results of this study may not be applicable to tax environments in other countries.

This paper aims to investigate the relationship between voluntary disclosure and the cost of capital as a direct relationship and as an indirect relationship mediated by information asymmetry. It provides evidence from Jordan as a developing economy.

The sample was selected from the companies listed in the first market of the Amman Stock Exchange during the period 2010–2019. Four exclusion criteria were used in selecting the companies for analysis.

The findings show that the cost of capital and information asymmetry are negatively affected by voluntary disclosure, as well as that the cost of capital is positively affected by information asymmetry. In addition, information asymmetry does not mediate the relationship between voluntary disclosure and the cost of capital.

This research looks at the mediating effect of information asymmetry in the relationship between voluntary disclosure and the cost of capital; thus, it provides new explanations about it using empirical evidence from a developing economy. As a necessary consequence, this research has the potential to significantly contribute to the existing body of knowledge and literature in this field.

This study aims to examine the impact of mandatory adoption of The Act 2013 in UK on voluntary carbon disclosure. Mandatory adoption of The Act 2013 in UK is a compelling setting to examine this research question because it is an exogenous imposed event and is unlikely to be affected by disclosure choice.

This study uses a difference-in-differences research design to examine the impact of mandatory adoption of The Act 2013 in UK on voluntary carbon disclosure. The treatment sample includes 451 UK firms subject to mandatory adoption of The Act 2013, and the control sample includes firms from 15 EU countries that did not mandate adoption during the sample period.

The authors document an increase in the quantity and quality of voluntary carbon disclosure following adoption of The Act 2013 in the treatment sample relative to the control sample. They also find that firms with better environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance experience a highly significant increase in voluntary carbon disclosure after adoption of The Act 2013. For firms from carbon-intensive vs less-carbon-intensive sectors, the results suggest that firms in carbon-intensive sectors experience a greater increase in the propensity of voluntary disclosure after adoption of The Act.

The authors examine the impact of mandatory adoption of The Act 2013 in UK on voluntary carbon disclosure and the impact of firms’ ESG activity on the relationship between voluntary and mandatory carbon disclosure. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this insight has never been documented in the literature.