Claas van der Linde

Bio: Claas van der Linde is an academic researcher from University of St. Gallen. The author has contributed to research in topics: Productivity & Porter hypothesis. The author has an hindex of 2, co-authored 3 publications receiving 10306 citations.

Toward a New Conception of the Environment-Competitiveness Relationship

Abstract: Accepting a fixed trade-off between environmental regulation and competitiveness unnecessarily raises costs and slows down environmental progress. Studies finding high environmental compliance costs have traditionally focused on static cost impacts, ignoring any offsetting productivity benefits from innovation. They typically overestimated compliance costs, neglected innovation offsets, and disregarded the affected industry's initial competitiveness. Rather than simply adding to cost, properly crafted environmental standards can trigger innovation offsets, allowing companies to improve their resource productivity. Shifting the debate from pollution control to pollution prevention was a step forward. It is now necessary to make the next step and focus on resource productivity.

Green and Competitive: Ending the Stalemate

Abstract: The need for regulation to protect the environment gets widespread but grudging acceptance: widespread because everyone wants a livable planet, grudging because of the lingering belief that environmental regulations erode competitiveness. The prevailing view is that there is an inherent and fixed trade-off: ecology versus the economy. On one side of the trade-off are the social benefits that arise from strict environmental standards. On the other are industry's private costs for prevention and cleanup -- costs that lead to higher prices and reduced competitiveness. With the argument framed this way, progress on environmental quality has become a kind of arm-wrestling match. One side pushes for tougher standards; the other tries to roll them back. The balance of power shifts one way or the other depending on the prevailing political winds. This static view of environmental regulation, in which everything except regulation is held constant, is incorrect. If technology, products, processes, and customer needs were all fixed, the conclusion that regulation must raise costs would be inevitable. But companies operate in the real world of dynamic competition, not in the static world of much economic theory. They are constantly finding innovative solutions to pressures of all sorts -- from competitors, customers, and regulators. Properly designed environmental standards can trigger innovations that lower the total cost of a product or improve its value. Such innovations allow companies to use a range of inputs more productively -- from raw materials to energy to labor -- thus offsetting the costs of improving environmental impact and ending the stalemate. Ultimately, this enhanced resource productivity makes companies more competitive, not less. Consider how the Dutch flower industry has responded to its environmental problems. Intense cultivation of flowers in small areas was contaminating the soil and groundwater with pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers. Facing increasingly strict regulation on the release of chemicals, the Dutch understood that the only effective way to address the problem would be to develop a closed-loop system. In advanced Dutch greenhouses, flowers now grow in water and rock wool, not in soil. This lowers the risk of infestation, reducing the need for fertilizers and pesticides, which are delivered in water that circulates and is reused. The tightly monitored closed-loop system also reduces variation in growing conditions, thus improving product quality. Handling costs have gone down because the flowers are cultivated on specially designed platforms. In addressing the environmental problem, then, the Dutch have innovated in ways that have raised the productivity with which they use many of the resources involved in growing flowers. The net result is not only dramatically lower environmental impact but also lower costs, better product quality, and enhanced global competitiveness. (See the insert "Innovating to Be Competitive: The Dutch Flower Industry.") This example illustrates why the debate about the relationship between competitiveness and the environment has been framed incorrectly. Policy makers, business leaders, and environmentalists have focused on the static cost impacts of environmental regulation and have ignored the more important offsetting productivity benefits from innovation. As a result, they have acted too often in ways that unnecessarily drive up costs and slow down progress on environmental issues. This static mind-set has thus created a self-fulfilling prophecy leading to ever more costly environmental regulation. Regulators tend to set regulations in ways that deter innovation. Companies, in turn, oppose and delay regulations instead of innovating to address them. The whole process has spawned an industry of litigators and consultants that drains resources away from real solutions. POLLUTION = INEFFICIENCY Are cases like the Dutch flower industry the exception rather than the rule? …

Medio ambiente y competitividad

Abstract: En la esfera de la economia aparecen los problemas ambientales como consecuencia del uso indiscriminado de los recursos naturales y procesos ineficientes de produccion, entre otras razones. En ese momento es cuando la regulacion ambiental se hace presente como mecanismo de intervencion del estado en busca de la conservacion y mantenimiento de los recursos disponibles, desafortunadamente estas medidas siempre han sido recibidas como un efecto negativo sobre la produccion, via costos.En este articulo se expone como puede ser recibida una medida de regulacion ambiental sobre una empresa o industria en particular de modo que no se generen costos sino, por el contrario, beneficios mediante la innovacion de procesos, productividad de los recursos y formulacion de un marco legal medioambiental acorde con las condiciones de cada pais. Esta tesis se ilustra mediante el analisis de varios casos de estudio donde se encuentra evidencia de una relacion positiva entre innovacion, competitividad y regulacion ambiental.en la esfera de la economia aparecen los problemas ambientales como consecuencia del uso indiscriminado de los recursos naturales y procesos ineficientes de produccion, entre otras razones. En ese momento es cuando la regulacion ambiental se hace presente como mecanismo de intervencion del estado en busca de la conservacion y mantenimiento de los recursos disponibles, desafortunadamente estas medidas siempre han sido recibidas como un efecto negativo sobre la produccion, via costos. En este articulo se expone como puede ser recibida una medida de regulacion ambiental sobre una empresa o industria en particular de modo que no se generen costos sino, por el contrario, beneficios mediante la innovacion de procesos, productividad de los recursos y formulacion de un marco legal medioambiental acorde con las condiciones de cada pais. Esta tesis se ilustra mediante el analisis de varios casos de estudio donde se encuentra evidencia de una relacion positiva entre innovacion, competitividad y regulacion ambiental.

Misery Loves Companies: Rethinking Social Initiatives by Business:

Abstract: Companies are increasingly asked to provide innovative solutions to deep-seated problems of human misery, even as economic theory instructs managers to focus on maximizing their shareholders' wealt

Corporate Social Responsibility Theories: Mapping the Territory

Abstract: The Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) field presents not only a landscape of theories but also a proliferation of approaches, which are controversial, complex and unclear. This article tries to clarify the sit- uation, ''mapping the territory'' by classifying the main CSR theories and related approaches in four groups: (1) instrumental theories, in which the corporation is seen as only an instrument for wealth creation, and its social activities are only a means to achieve economic results; (2) political theories, which concern themselves with the power of corporations in society and a responsible use of this power in the political arena; (3) integrative theories, in which the corporation is focused on the satisfaction of social demands; and (4) ethical theories, based on ethical responsibilities of corporations to society. In practice, each CSR theory presents four dimensions related to profits, political performance, social demands and ethical values. The findings suggest the necessity to develop a new theory on the business and society relationship, which should integrate these four dimensions.

Green supply‐chain management: A state‐of‐the‐art literature review

Abstract: Vol. 9 Issue 1 pp. 000‐000 There is a growing need for integrating environmentally sound choices into supply-chain management research and practice. Perusal of the literature shows that a broad frame of reference for green supply-chain management (GrSCM) is not adequately developed. Regulatory bodies that formulate regulations to meet societal and ecological concerns to facilitate growth of business and economy also suffer from its absence. A succinct classification to help academicians, researchers and practitioners in understanding integrated GrSCM from a wider perspective is needed. Further, sufficient literature is available to warrant such classification. This paper takes an integrated and fresh look into the area of GrSCM. The literature on GrSCM is covered exhaustively from its conceptualization, primarily taking a ‘reverse logistics angle’. Using the rich body of available literature, including earlier reviews that had relatively limited perspectives, the literature on GrSCM is classified on the basis of the problem context in supply chain’s major influential areas. It is also classified on the basis of methodology and approach adopted. Various mathematical tools/techniques used in literature vis-a-vis the contexts of GrSCM are mapped. A timeline indicating relevant papers is also provided as a ready reference. Finally, the findings and interpretations are summarized, and the main research issues and opportunities are highlighted.

Why Companies Go Green: A Model of Ecological Responsiveness

Abstract: The authors conducted a qualitative study of the motivations and contextual factors that induce corporate ecological responsiveness. Analytic induction applied to data collected from 53 firms in the United Kingdom and Japan revealed three motivations: competitiveness, legitimation, and ecological responsibility. These motivations were influenced by three contextual conditions: field cohesion, issue salience, and individual concern. In this article, the authors also identify the conditions that likely lead to high corporate ecological responsiveness.