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Researchers have reported a positive, negative, and neutral impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) on financial performance. This inconsistency may be due to flawed empirical analysis. In this paper, we demonstrate a particular flaw in existing econometric studies of the relationship between social and financial performance. These studies estimate the effect of CSR by regressing firm performance on corporate social performance, and several control variables. This model is misspecified because it does not control for investment in R&D, which has been shown to be an important determinant of firm performance. This misspecification results in upwardly biased estimates of the financial impact of CSR. When the model is properly specified, we find that CSR has a neutral impact on financial performance.

The past few decades have been characterized by a growing body of profit-seeking public service areas with the understanding that profit-seeking organizations will deliver public services more efficiently than government can. These sectors include, but are not limited to, health care, corrections, education and garbage collection. Governments have created quasi markets to attract private providers of services in these sectors, with varying results. Organizational economics has provided the primary explanation for quasi markets, but questions about the sought-for efficiencies actually realized through these markets persist. We integrate resource dependence theory and organizational economics to provide a more comprehensive explanation of the persistence of quasi markets.

The foundation of sustainability science is the effort to understand the fundamental interactions between nature and society, and to guide these interactions along sustainable trajectories (Miller et al. Sustain Sci 9(2):240–246, 2014 ). More importantly, sustainability science aims at creating knowledge needed to improve relevancy and quality of sustainability decision-making processes through broader representation of knowledge and values. This study contributes to the sustainability science literature in the areas of strategic planning and decision-making. Both the values and the role of decision-making science in promoting sustainability are examined through the design of a strategic framework and application of a graphical multi-agent decision-making model (GMADM). This approach allows for analysis, valuation, and ranking of potential sustainability initiatives according to their projected benefits and gains for organizations and for society. The model is structured on three interrelated pillars: (I) stakeholder views and concerns (government, industry, academic institutions); (II) sustainable development trends and requirements (World Bank data); and (III) valuations of the benefits expected from sustainability efforts. The framework is applied to case studies of Shandong and Guangdong provinces in China. Qualitative and quantitative analysis of data obtained from three groups of stakeholders in each province confirmed the utility of the proposed decision-making approach for promoting sustainable transition in China. Results also demonstrated the convenience and effectiveness of the proposed framework for guiding organizations’ efforts toward optimizing their sustainability initiatives while supporting regional economic growth and sustainable development policies.

Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, the authors estimate the returns to job search, mobility, and the interaction of search and mobility for young men and women. They find statistically significant gender differences in mobility patterns and search behavior, but not in the returns to a given behavior. Both men and women engaged in substantial job search and mobility early in their careers, which resulted in wage growth premiums. There is evidence of an interactive effect: returns to search were realized through mobility, and returns to mobility were augmented by search.

One of the assumptions of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) in transportation studies is the substitutability/transformation of inputs/outputs. In this paper we examine three transport modes that frequently have employed DEA to measure technical efficiency. We ascertain whether input substitutions and output transformations are present in the transport data, and the impact on transport DEA scores when substitutions or transformations are not present. We then propose methods for correcting substitution and transformation specification errors. Future transport DEA studies should test for substitution and transformation in their data, to avoid biased DEA scores and spurious second-stage regression results.

A study examined the use of event studies in management research and found that there was inadequate attention paid to theoretical and research design issues. This lack of attention may lead to false information regarding the significance of the events and the validity of the theories being tested. To illustrate the extent of this problem, the study attempted to replicate 3 recent studies. To guide authors and reviewers, procedures for appropriate use of the event study method are presented.

PurposeTo develop an understanding of communication among agribusiness journals and to examine patterns of citations that allow the measurement and description of the structure of communication flows among those journals in a network.Design/methodology/approachThe data for this study were gathered from the Journal Citation Reports (JCR) published by Thomson Scientific (Philadelphia). The authors conducted a bibliometric analysis, based on an international trade analogy to explain the network of agribusiness journals and how these journals communicate with business and economics journals.FindingsBusiness and economics journals and, particularly the traditionally major ones, surprisingly were scarcely every used. However, the British Food Journal stood out with 50 citations to marketing and strategic management journals.Research limitations/implicationsThere are predominantly four such limitations: only 33 journals were studied, only one 5-year time period was involved, that time period is a few years old and the journal characteristics were derived using data from the “Scopes” and “Information for Authors” text on the website of each journal.Practical implicationsExchanges of agribusiness knowledge and information among diverse stakeholders (consumers, suppliers and public agencies) in a complex environment require a better understanding of the network of agribusiness journals and their relation to traditional business and economics journals.Social implicationsNetworks of journals facilitate cooperation and interactions to improve developments in the field.Originality/valueExamining citations from and to the field of agribusiness is interesting and important because knowledge is transferred through networks comprise those who contribute to journals, read them and learn from them, i.e. by “talking” to each other as well as by practitioners who also read and learn from those journals.

Managers continually encounter demands from multiple stakeholder groups to devote resources to corporate social responsibility (CSR). An important debate regarding the relationship between CSR and financial performance has been stimulated. A supply and demand model of corporate social responsibility is outlined. A hypothesis based on this framework is that a firm's level of CSR will depend on its size, level of diversification, research and development, advertising, government sales, consumer income, labor market conditions, and stage in the industry life cycle. From these hypotheses, it is concluded that there is an \"ideal\" level of CSR, which managers can determine via cost-benefit analysis, and that there is a neutral relationship between CSR and financial performance.