Search results

This paper aims to identify academic literature studies on corruption in the supply chain management (SCM) from 2005 to 2016 to propose a research agenda. The review links this possible new course of research within the sustainable development goals (SDGs) framework, proposed by the United Nations from 2015 to 2030.

A literature review method was used in the academic research to identify which approaches are used for corruption in SCM. The analysis of the context of SDGs required an integrated approach once the goals are interconnected.

Despite the increase in research studies in 2015, there is still little research focusing specifically on corruption in SCM. There is a broad opportunity to connect the research on corruption in SCM with the context of the practice to achieve the SDGs.

Considering the economic, social and environmental risks of corruption practices in SCM and the scarce academic literature on these themes together, a research agenda with interdisciplinary groups is suggested to deepen the subjects. There are some questions related to corruption in SCM and its connections with practice to achieve the SDGs.

A growing number of private, voluntary and mandatory sustainability standards have recently emerged. However, supply chain corruption practices as mechanisms to circumvent sustainability standards have also grown and occur regularly. This paper strives to elaborate theory on the intersection of institutional theory, business corruption and the sustainability standards literature by investigating factors that influence the emergence of supply chain corruption practices.

Based on secondary data, four in-depth case studies of supply chain corruption practices are investigated through the use of adaptive theory and the method of constant comparisons to elaborate theory on this important phenomenon.

The paper suggests that although sustainability standards can improve supply chain sustainability performance, if they are adopted only symbolically and not substantively, unanticipated outcomes such as supply chain corruption may occur. The study proposes a typology of supply chain corruption practices, further explores the symbolic adoption of sustainability standards in supply chains and proposes the novel construct of “social isomorphism for corruption.” Since focal companies play central roles in leading supply chain corruption practices, we reason that they can also play a pivotal role in preventing supply chain corruption practices by promoting the substantive adoption of sustainability standards across their supply chains.

This paper elaborates theory on the challenging phenomenon of corruption in supply chains by linking the supply chain management literature to the corruption and the sustainability discourses and offers important insights to aid our understanding on the topic. It generates six propositions and four contributions to the sustainable supply chain management theory, practice and policy.

Brazilian federalism was important in the political game of combating the pandemic for three reasons. First, Brazil's public health system depends heavily on intergovernmental relations between Union, states, and municipalities because there is a policy portfolio based on federative cooperation. Second, the subnational governments' autonomy to act against COVID-19 was constantly questioned by the Federal Government – the conflict between the President and governors was a key piece in all health policy. Finally, states and local governments were primarily responsible for policies to fight against pandemic, but the absence and/or wrong measures taken by the Federal Government (such as the delay in purchasing vaccines) generated intergovernmental incoordination, increased territorial inequality, and reduced the effectiveness of subnational public policies, especially those linked to social isolation. In this context, Brazilian federalism played a dual role in the pandemic. On the one hand, the federative structure partially succeeded in averting an even worse scenario, mitigating the impact of mistaken presidential decisions. The role of subnational governments, especially of the states, was critical as a counterweight to federal decisions. On the other hand, the President actively acted against governors and mayors and, above all, sought to weaken intergovernmental articulations within the Unified Health System (SUS), the federative model designed three decades ago. One could say that the federative actors, such as the Supreme Court (Supremo Tribunal Federal – STF) and subnational governments, were the main obstacles for the Bolsonarist antiscientific agenda. The success of this reaction to President Bolsonaro's negationist populism was partial, but the results of the fight against COVID-19 would have been much worse without these federalist barriers.

The paper describes patterns of study on innovation in the regional economic resilience literature regarding methods and findings.

This study is a descriptive one and it uses, as a method, the scoping review based on Scopus and Web of Science databases. Forty-eight theoretical-empirical papers were thematically coded, and analyses were conducted using R packages and MaxQDA.

Innovation has been used narrowly in the regional resilience literature, considering the variables, the types of shocks and the analyzed loci. From the sampled papers, this study suggests that, depending on the operationalization, the addressed relationship can be positive or negative, which still needs further investigation. In addition, the study identified two lines of research. The first, characterized by quantitative research, secondary sources and multivariate analyses, focuses on testing predictive regional resilience models based on innovation-related variables. The second, characterized by qualitative or multi-method approaches, is more concerned with explaining the knowledge accumulation and the learning capacity related to regional innovation.

The paper’s findings show a restricted view of the innovation–resilience relationship. Although this study does not present a meta-analysis, it reveals gaps for future research. Some suggestions can be highlighted, such as (1) expanding knowledge about innovation as a predictor of resilience, (2) the theoretical development of this relationship to guide empirical investigations and (3) studies that consider the meso or micro level, approaching the role of actors in fostering innovation in the regional resilience process.

This paper fulfills an identified need to investigate how innovation has been operationalized in regional resilience empirical research.

We present a critical literature review debating Brazilian research on social and environmental accounting (SEA). The aim of this study is to understand the role of politics in the construction of hegemonies in SEA research in Brazil. In particular, we examine the role of hegemony in relation to the co-option of SEA literature and sustainability in the Brazilian context by the logic of development for economic growth in emerging economies. The methodological approach adopts a post-structural perspective that reflects Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory. The study employs a hermeneutical, rhetorical approach to understand and classify 352 Brazilian research articles on SEA. We employ Brown and Fraser’s (2006) categorizations of SEA literature to help in our analysis: the business case, the stakeholder–accountability approach, and the critical case. We argue that the business case is prominent in Brazilian studies. Second-stage analysis suggests that the major themes under discussion include measurement, consulting, and descriptive approach. We argue that these themes illustrate the degree of influence of the hegemonic politics relevant to emerging economics, as these themes predominantly concern economic growth and a capitalist context. This paper discusses trends and practices in the Brazilian literature on SEA and argues that the focus means that SEA avoids critical debates of the role of capitalist logics in an emerging economy concerning sustainability. We urge the Brazilian academy to understand the implications of its reifying agenda and engage, counter-hegemonically, in a social and political agenda beyond the hegemonic support of a particular set of capitalist interests.

This study analyzes earnings management among Brazilian public firms during the 2016 Presidential Impeachment.

The sample comprises, as a treatment group, 721 firm-quarter observations relating to Brazilian listed firms. It also considers a control group of listed firms from Mexico, which were not affected by the exogenous shock analyzed (i.e. the 2016 Presidential Impeachment in Brazil). The firms' quarterly financial data cover the period between 2013 and 2018.

Considering several proxies related to earnings management by accruals, the main findings suggest a negative relationship between the 2016 impeachment event and the level of discretionary accruals, suggesting that Brazilian firms tended to reduce their earnings management levels during the impeachment process. The results are robust whether the control group is considered or not.

This study brings new empirical evidence to the literature on accounting information quality about the role of the economic and political environment in earnings management, especially in weak institution countries characterized by institutional voids and higher levels of corruption.

The chapter addresses the unique aspects of Brazil’s news agencies and the Brazilian news syndication market. It reveals the pattern of Brazil’s two prevailing business models regarding the wire services industry: that of the State, particularly the federal government, which invested little in a nationwide distributor to peripheral and alternative media; and that of major media conglomerates, which set out their syndication services labeled as “news agencies” in order to multiply profits with no extra labor. In the latter case, an asymmetrical relationship of dependency and circularity ensues between these major conglomerates and regional media groups, who rely on these “news agencies” to perpetuate their dominance in local markets. The chapter also assesses a few causes for this unique model and describes the main players in Brazil’s news agency sector. A concise historical background is presented (Molina, Morais, Saroldi & Moreira) and provides context for the present-day players in the news agency business in Brazil, including the institutional framework they form with their customers, predominantly smaller newspapers. The chapter analyzes attributes of the Brazilian news agency ecology, including the parallel reach of distribution networks belonging to the private and state-owned agencies; the adaptation of conglomerate agencies to challenges entailed by the digital convergence (shrinking newsrooms, multitasking staff); and the prevalence of the interconglomerate model within the Brazilian news syndication industry.