Transforming the Dynamics of Climate Politics in Japan: Business’ Response to Securitization

In 2020, Japan suddenly changed course and made carbon neutrality its intermediate target. In an attempt to understand this drastic policy change, this article analyzes the effects of climate security discourses on the perception of the Japanese business community, which holds the pivotal position in Japan’s climate policy. It particularly focuses on the effect of securitization on the source–impact asymmetry, one of the intrinsic features identified as a major obstacle to effective climate governance. From this standpoint, the article measures the extent to which the issue of climate change has been securitized in Japan, and also the extent to which the Japanese business community has come to share the securitizers’ sense of exigency. In so doing, this article employs the text-mining method called KH Coder to analyze relevant government documents as well as statements issued by Keidanren (also known as Japan Business Federation). The analysis shows that the Ministry of the Environment together with other governmental actors has collectively securitized the issue within the context of Japanese society, but that its impact on industry has been indirect, pointing to the complexity of its causal impact.

Business Behavior in the Face of Severe Weather: Studying the Effects of Deterministic and Probabilistic Warning Systems

Tornadoes are nature’s most violent storm and annually cause billions in damage along with the threat of fatalities and injuries. To improve tornado warnings, the National Weather Service is considering a change from a deterministic to a probabilistic paradigm. While studies have been conducted on how individual behavior may change with the new While studies have been conducted on how individual behavior may change with the new businesses. This project is a response to the Weather Research and Forecasting Innovation Act of 2017, H.R. 353, which calls for the use of social and behavioral science to study and improve storm warning systems. The goal is to discuss business response to probabilistic tornado warnings through descriptive and regression-based statistics using a survey administered to businesses in North Texas. Prior to release, the survey was vetted by a focus group comprised of businesses in Grayson County, TX who assisted in the creation of a behavior ranking scale. The scale ranked behaviors from low to high effort. Responses allowed for determining if the business reacted to the warning in a passive or active manner. Returned surveys came from large and small businesses in North Texas and represent a wide variety of industries. Regression analysis explores which variables have the greatest influence on businesses’ behavior and show that beyond increases in probability from the probabilistic warnings, trust in the warning provides the most significant change to behavior.

Entrepreneurship in the time of COVID-19: Challenges, Opportunities and Governmet Assistance in Latvia

The aim of this article is to analyse the government assistance provided to entrepreneurs in Latvia and its efficiency and appropriateness to the economic conditions encountered by entrepreneurs during the COVID-19 crisis. An insight into international experience creates the framework of this study. The empirical analysis is based on secondary data analysis and entrepreneur’s survey data on business response to COVID-19 related pandemics restrictions and government assistance in Latvia. The observed business areas are financial and risk management, international trade, communication, employment, innovations, strategic change and legal issues. The paper finds that the crisis affected the most such industries as accommodation and food services; arts, entertainment and recreation. The result provides support to justification for a national long-term crisis management strategy for business sustainability.

Business response to COVID-19 impact: Effectiveness analysis in South Africa

Background: Following the outbreak of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), many businesses have put out measures to counter the impact of the outbreak and its related reactions from economic actors (individuals, authorities and other businesses) on their business operations. However, nearly no empirical studies or reports have been carried out to investigate the effectiveness of those measures.Aim: This study aimed at examining the effectiveness of business response measures to COVID-19 impact on business outcome.Setting: This study focused on businesses that are value-added tax (VAT) registered.Methods: A cross-sectional survey design was used. The authors applied logistic regression technique to analyse the effectiveness of business response measures on business outcome.Results: The authors found evidence that business responses such as virtual connection, innovative e-commerce and increasing working hours are more effective business responses, whilst decreasing work hours, laying off workers temporarily and ordinary e-commerce are less effective measures against the impact of the outbreak. Furthermore, business characteristics such as industry type (e.g. ‘agriculture, hunting, forestry and fishing’ and ‘electricity, gas and water supply’) are more resilient to COVID-19 shock, whilst pure export market and small businesses, secondary and tertiary, are significantly less resilient.Conclusions: Firstly, the study shows that some business responses are more effective in remediating the adverse impact of COVID-19 and therefore recommends policy intervention and industrial actions to promote them. Secondly, it is also recommended that financial bailout and/or Internet infrastructure and domestic support for small and export businesses could make them more resilient to the adverse impact of the outbreak.

Revealing industry challenge and business response to Covid-19: a text mining approach

Purpose This study aims to conduct a “real-time” investigation with user-generated content on Twitter to reveal industry challenges and business responses to the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic. Specifically, using the hospitality industry as an example, the study analyses how Covid-19 has impacted the industry, what are the challenges and how the industry has responded. Design/methodology/approach With 94,340 tweets collected between October 2019 and May 2020 by a programmed Web scraper, unsupervised machine learning approaches such as structural topic modelling are applied. Originality/value This study contributes to the literature on business response during crises providing for the first time a study of using unstructured content on social media for industry-level analysis in the hospitality context.

The lepers, lunatics, the lame, the blind, the infirm and the making of asylums and benevolent charities: the Indian merchant class and disability in colonial India

Purpose This study aims to explore the role of the Indian merchant class in 19th-century colonial India in addressing the social concerns of disability. Specifically, it addresses why and how business engaged with disability in colonial India. Design/methodology/approach This study’s methodology entailed historiographical approach and archival investigation of official correspondence and letters of business people in 19th-century colonial India. Findings Using institutional theory, the study’s findings indicate that guided by philanthropic and ethical motives, Indian businesses, while recognizing the normative and cognitive challenges, accepted the regulative institutional pressures of colonial India and adopted an involved and humane approach. This manifested in the construction of asylums and the setting up of bequeaths and charitable funds for people with disability (PwD). The principal institutional drivers in making of the asylums and the creation of benevolent charities were religion, social practices, caste-based expectations, exposure to Western education and Victorian and Protestantism ideologies, the emergence of colonial notions of health, hygiene and medicine, carefully crafted socio-political and economic policies of the British Raj and the social aspirations of the native merchant class. Originality/value In contrast to the 20th-century rights-based movement of the West, which gave birth to the global term of “disability,” a collective representation of different types of disabilities, this paper locates that cloaked in individual forms of sickness, the identity of PwD in 19th-century colonial India appeared under varied fragmented labels such as those of leper, lunatic, blind and infirm. This paper broadens the understanding of how philanthropic business response to disability provided social acceptability and credibility to business people as benevolent members of society. While parallelly, for PwD, it reinforced social marginalization and the need for institutionalization, propagating perceptions of unfortunate and helpless members of society.

Green Marketing Mix

The purpose of this paper is to report the findings of a systematic review of literature in green marketing domain and to propose directions for future research. Green marketing issues are delineated from literature extending marketing orientation and marketing mix frameworks. As society becomes more concerned with the natural environment, businesses modify their behaviour in an attempt to address society's concerns. Based on the literature review, the conceptual review and direction for future research have been delineated and discussed. The paper concludes with the evidences of integration between sustainability and marketing in forms of corporate environmental actions and green marketing practices in businesses. The paper deals with the concept of 4-Ps and the green marketing practice as business response to the increasing environmental consciousness of consumers in the market. The discussion highlights future research avenues and consequent implications for marketers of green products in designing their marketing strategies.