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General Deterrence And Corporate Environmental Behavior, Dorothy Thornton, Neil Gunningham, Robert Kagan Dec 2015

General Deterrence And Corporate Environmental Behavior, Dorothy Thornton, Neil Gunningham, Robert Kagan

Robert Kagan

This research addresses the assumption that“general deterrence” is an important key to enhanced compliance with regulatory laws. Through a survey of 233 firms in several industries in the United States, we sought to answer the following questions: (1) When severe legal penalties are imposed against a violator of environmental laws, do other companies in the same industry actually learn about such“signal cases”? (2) Does knowing about“signal cases” change firms’ compliance-related behavior? It was found that only 42 percent of respondents could identify the“signal case,” but 89 percent could identify some enforcement actions against other firms, and 63 percent of firms …


The Unfinished Story Of The Rio Plus 20 Conference, John Dernbach Oct 2012

The Unfinished Story Of The Rio Plus 20 Conference, John Dernbach

John C. Dernbach

Reporting on the 2012 U.N. Conference on Sustainable Development (or Rio+20 conference) has generally followed two lines: the conference was essentially a failure because of its tepid official response to the enormous and related problems of global environmental degradation and global poverty; and the conference successfully managed to mobilize hundreds of voluntary commitments and at least $513 billion for specific sustainability goals. A third story line has received little attention, however, and may redeem the account of official failure. This article addresses that story line, reviewing a series of processes set in motion by the parties to the conference that …