Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This study explores why ISO (the International Organizations for standardizations, here after ISO) standards are diffused among Korean firms. Hypotheses are developed from functional approaches and neo-institutional perspectives. The functional approaches focus on strategic benefits and maximizing efficiency as a result of the adoption of the ISO standards. To contrast based on neo-institutionalism, I argue that firms adopt the ISO certificates to gain legitimacy and to survive. It consequently benefits the adopters and this is why the ISO standards are widely accepted. I assume that middle size firms that struggle to survive between small and big organizations are more likely to accept the ISO guidelines. Otherwise, they will face much greater pressure to incorporate the standards. Using a sample of 100 Korean firms from the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry and firms’ websites between 1992 and 2006, this research shows that the diffusion of ISO standards is initiated by both managerial strategy and peer-pressure.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper brings a socio-legal perspective to the emergence of non-state market-driven governance, examining how non-state regulatory authority is constituted and contested in the context of the forthcoming ISO 26000 social responsibility guidance standard. ISO is just one of many organizations claiming some kind of authority to promulgate norms to regulate social responsibility, and the proposed ISO 26000 standard is just one of (almost) countless such norms. In this crowded regulatory field, ISO 26000 competes with civil society-led, governmental, inter-governmental and other efforts to regulate corporate conduct in the name of social responsibility. These various organizations and norms compete with each other in what might be considered a "market" for governance authority, which is to say, legitimacy. Ultimately, the paper argues that whether particular non-state governance initiatives will flourish or disappear, and whether and how will they change over time, will be influencedfundamentally by the extent to which their claims to legitimacy succeed. Thus, by examining the structural features of this "market" for legitimacy, the legitimation and delegitimation strategies deployed by the various actors involved, and the success or failure of these strategic efforts to gain legitimacy from potential rule takers and other relevant audiences, the paper seeks to identify some of the key factors that might be expected to influence the future direction of non-state market-driven governance.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: The International Organization for Standardization (ISO), the leading source of global voluntary standards for business, recently joined the burgeoning global competition for rule-making authority in the field of corporate social responsibility (CSR). In 2005 it began to develop global standards for social responsibility. This is just one of many non-state and state-based efforts to develop transnational regimes to regulate CSR. Legitimation is a critical but largely overlooked aspect of these competing rule-making efforts: how do various actors seek to establish or contest the authority of alternative rule-making institutions? How do rule-makers seek to enrol rule-takers in desired authority relations? This paper examines ISO’s quest for rule-making authority from a pluralist socio-legal perspective. It investigates how ISO’s authority in the field of CSR is legitimated or delegitimated vis-à-vis its principal competitors. It examines these legitimation dynamics not just at the level of strategic, deliberate interaction but also at the “infra-strategic” level of the “mentalities” in which strategic legitimation efforts are embedded, something that has been almost entirely overlooked in current debates about private, non-state governance. Ultimately this competition for legitimacy is a struggle for the “soul of global business”: a struggle to (re)define the character and role of the business corporation as a social actor in the 21st century, and one that will have profound implications for environmental quality and human welfare around the world.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Voluntary programs are an important development in the
environmental governance arena. Such programs promise a virtual panacea
for governments by lowering the costs of monitoring and enforcing
environmental regulations. Arguably, to achieve their wide-spread
adoption, governments need to provide incentives for joining voluntary
programs, such as environmental audit laws that require regulators to
be lenient with firms' self-disclosed regulatory violations. However,
skeptics argue that because profit-seeking firms may tend to skirt
costly regulations, only strictly monitored and enforced regulations
can compel compliance. Further, firms may interpret environmental audit
laws enacted to encourage self-policing as licenses to pollute and end
up hurting the environment.
ISO 14001 is a non-governmental code that requires firms to establish
environmental management systems and have them audited by external
auditors. Its adoption rates have varied across U.S. states. We expect
ISO 14001 certified facilities should have lower pollution emissions
than non-certified facilities, and versus their pre-certification
levels. Moreover, certified facilities' performance improvements
should be even more pronounced where governments have enacted
environmental audit laws that provide confidence to firms to invite
external auditors to assess their environmental management systems.
One criteria for evaluation voluntary programs such as ISO 14001 is
pollution reduction. Our paper contributes to the literature on
voluntary self-policing programs by examining how ISO 14001 (a key
self-policing program) influences firms' environmental performance.
Building on our previous work, the research design for this paper
centers on a panel of study of several thousand large facilities in the
US. The analyses will compare the environmental performance (as
reflected in TRI emissions) comparing facilities that have received ISO
14001 certification with those that have not, and comparing of ISO
14001 certified facilities’ emissions pre and post certification.
Given the conflictual climate of environmental governance in many
jurisdictions, an emphasis on voluntary programs raises important
issues about the prospects for their efficacy.
Our research should inform both academic and public dialogues about
whether and when voluntary programs
and public policy can improve firms' environmental
performance.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: One approach to management improvement, widely used in the U.S. private sector, is to secure quality certification under ISO (International Organization for Standardization) 9001 standard.