Abstract: This study challenges the implicit assumption of institutional homogeneity that is commonly assumed in past research on the persistence of firm performance. It proposes that the national institutional context is an essential driver of firm performance persistence, as it affects competition in the factor and product markets. Using an institutional economics perspective and firm and institutional level data from 10,674 firms in 35 countries, we show that cross country institutional variations in the formal institutions of the product, finance and labor markets indeed lead to differences in the persistence of firm performance over time.

Abstract: Reputation is associated with numerous firm outcomes (Caruana, Cohen & Krentler, 2006; Dowling, 2006), and is well established as a significant interest area in the strategy field (Fombrun & Shanley, 1990). However, while numerous studies exist regarding the liability of foreignness (Zaheer, 1995; Mezias, 2002), little work examines whether and how reputation differs between foreign and domestic firms. Moreover, some recent work suggests that foreignness may not always be a liability, but can sometimes be beneficial (Newburry, Gardberg & Belkin, 2006). We examine the effect of foreignness on reputation perceptions of over 600 companies within 25 countries, examined as part of the Reputation Institution’s 2007 reputation survey. We find that foreignness does not directly impact reputation, but is moderated by country-, industry-, and individual-level variables.

Abstract: In this paper I suggest that the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) activities of firms are sometimes driven by the fear of reputation externalities. When the stakeholders are unable to observe the actual social performance of the firms, single offenders in an industry can damage the reputation of their peers. To avoid indiscriminate penalties from stakeholders, industry members will try to build informal private regulatory schemes and will share information and knowledge with sub-performers in order to facilitate their convergence on best practices. I present a scheme launched by the steel industry in response to the Climate Change issue as evidence. Implications for CSR research and strategy research are discussed.

Abstract: We examine how and why two major institutional groups in the United States (U.S.) business community - leading corporations and U.S. business schools - are differently contributing to public discourse on the purpose of business by differently expressing attention to social issues. We bridge five theoretical perspectives: institutional theory, an attention based view of the firm, reputation theory, resource dependence theory, and stakeholder theory to argue that corporations’ commercial focus counter intuitively promotes institutional change. Specifically, commercial focus promotes attention to diverse social issues, and corresponding stakeholder interests, that traditionally have been considered at odds with a profit-driven, shareholder primacy focus. We discuss here a data source and methodology for examining this topic in greater detail and report some of our findings.