Corporate Strategies for Climate Change Impact Mitigation
Abstract
This thesis explores firm adaptation to changes in its external environment, using climate change as the emerging issue. The thesis incorporates the Resource-Based View (RBV) and Dynamic Capabilities in Essays 1 and 2 and Stakeholder Theory in Essay 3 through which to better understand how firms adapt. Essay 1 develops an original conceptual approach which augments the RBV of the firm and identifies investments in four firm-level resource domains (Governance, Information management, Systems, and Technology) to develop capabilities in climate change mitigation. The resulting framework is denoted as the GISTe model, which frames the analysis and recommendations. The research uses the 2008 Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) database, with high-quality information on firm-level climate change strategies for 552 FT500 and non FT500 firms from North America or Europe.
Essay 2 extends the static version of the GISTe model to include dynamic components. This model is then applied to a cohort of firms from either North America or Europe regarding adaptation between 2004 and 2012. The research uses the 2004, 2008, and 2012 CDP databases with high-quality firm-level information on 117 FT500 firms from North America or Europe.
Essay 3 interprets the phenomenon of imposed innovation projects through a stakeholder management lens, building upon empirical evidence from a qualitative case study of a salient imposed innovation, namely carbon capture and storage (CCS) storage. Whereas Essay 1 and Essay 2 treated technology investments as either reversible or non-reversible in the context of unconstrained choice, Essay 3 takes one tool (CCS) that was not fully embraced by any firm active in the oil and gas sector due to an unfavourable cost-benefit analysis. The analysis treats this technology as an imposed innovation in response to powerful non-market stakeholders. In this constrained environment, influencing strategies for both government and company stakeholders are developed.
Overall, this thesis concludes that the GISTe model provides a valuable conceptual lens through which to explicate firm adaptation to changes in its external environment. Further, this thesis concludes that government should foster technologies from which firms select the most appropriate technology, but government should refrain from imposing any specific technology.
Description
Keywords
Business Administration--Management
Citation
Backman, C. (2017). Corporate Strategies for Climate Change Impact Mitigation (Doctoral thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/25467