Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • July/August 2004
  • Article
  • Business Strategy and the Environment

Stakeholders and Environmental Management Practices: An Institutional Framework

By: Magali Delmas and Michael W. Toffel
  • Format:Print
  • | Pages:14
ShareBar

Abstract

Despite burgeoning research on companies' environmental strategies and environmental management practices, it remains unclear why some firms adopt environmental management practices beyond regulatory compliance. This paper leverages institutional theory by proposing that stakeholders—including governments, regulators, customers, competitors, community and environmental interest groups, and industry associations—impose coercive and normative pressures on firms. However, the way in which managers perceive and act upon these pressures at the plant level depends upon plant- and parent-company-specific factors, including their track record of environmental performance, the competitive position of the parent company and the organizational structure of the plant. Beyond providing a framework of how institutional pressures influence plants' environmental management practices, various measures are proposed to quantify institutional pressures, key plant-level and parent-company-level characteristics and plant-level environmental management practices.

Keywords

Strategy; Management Practices and Processes; Environmental Management; Adoption; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Organizational Structure; Factories, Labs, and Plants; Competition; Framework; Governance Compliance; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms

Citation

Delmas, Magali, and Michael W. Toffel. "Stakeholders and Environmental Management Practices: An Institutional Framework." Business Strategy and the Environment 13, no. 4 (July/August 2004): 209–222.
  • Find it at Harvard
  • Read Now

About The Author

Michael W. Toffel

Technology and Operations Management
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • June 2025
    • Faculty Research

    Arla Foods: Data-Driven Decarbonization

    By: Michael Parzen, Michael W. Toffel and Susan Pinckney
    • 2025
    • Faculty Research

    How Firms Respond to Worker Activism: Evidence from Global Supply Chains

    By: Yanhua Bird, Jodi L. Short and Michael W. Toffel
    • May 2025
    • Faculty Research

    Calyx Global: Rating Carbon Credits

    By: Michael W. Toffel and Adam Chen
More from the Authors
  • Arla Foods: Data-Driven Decarbonization By: Michael Parzen, Michael W. Toffel and Susan Pinckney
  • How Firms Respond to Worker Activism: Evidence from Global Supply Chains By: Yanhua Bird, Jodi L. Short and Michael W. Toffel
  • Calyx Global: Rating Carbon Credits By: Michael W. Toffel and Adam Chen
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College.