Corporate Environmentalism: An Emerging Economy Perspective

Corporate environmentalism recognizes the importance of environmental issues to a corporation and how it integrates these issues into its strategy. Studies in the US and Spain have identified three variables, namely, public concern, regulatory pressures and competitive advantage to be significant in influencing corporate environmentalism. Emerging countries, although significant contributors to global environmental concerns have generally been ignored in the corporate environmentalism literature. We collected data through a questionnaire survey from managers operating in a variety of industries in Pakistan, an emerging market. Structural equation modeling technique was used for data analysis. Results show that, unlike in the developed countries, customer concern is not an antecedent of corporate environmentalism. Top management commitment was found to be important, both directly and as a mediating variable which has important implications for research and policy in this context.