Climate Change Policy, Economics, and Governance
My multidisciplinary research in this area--bridging the fields of economics, political science, and management--speaks to several audiences: economists, political scientists, and management and policy scholars. Under my mentorship, undergraduate and graduate students have helped to collect and code a plethora of data to track a census of global businesses' climate mitigation and performance over time and across scales of governance, sectors, and markets.
My research in this area investigates the various and interacting roles that different levels of governance have played in inducing and shaping corporate environmental behavior. In particular, I have explored the effects of the interactions between micro (e.g., firm’s internal managerial capabilities) and macro (e.g., domestic and global economy and governance) incentives and constraints on firm behavior. My publications on firm responses to global climate change are listed here.
My upcoming MIT Press book, Corporations at Climate Crossroads: Multilevel Governance, Public Policy, and Global Climate Action, develops a political economy framework whereby corporations and managerial and executive leaders inside them are key players in a nested structure of climate change governance with interactions between bottom-up and top-down processes involving firm, regulatory, and global governance.
Drawing on evidence from large-N panel data analyses (with attention to causal inference) and illustrative company case studies, the book answers the following questions:
Many global businesses “talk a good game,” but which firm, regulatory, and global governance factors and their interactions compel global businesses to participate at higher levels in voluntary climate action?
Do global businesses that participate in voluntary climate action emit less carbon emissions?
How do the mix of favorable climate governance conditions vary across industry sectors and in developed versus developing countries?