Paper Titles & Abstracts

Employing a multi-disciplinary approach, this paper combines concepts from two bodies of literature. Drawing on political science and public policy analysis, the first is concerned with the notion of governance and modes of governance. The second, located within management studies and business ethics, involves the notion of corporate social responsibility. Specifically, the paper explores the roles of, and relationships between, three sets of societal actors (business, government and the third sector) in the area of climate change public policy. The paper takes as its focal point the Copenhagen summit in December 2009. The primary research conducted for this paper, a large scale postal survey of UK-based firms, collected data to answer the following questions. What role do UK-registered firms see themselves as having with regard to challenge of climate change in comparison to other policy actors? Did the surveyed firms participate in national and international climate change policy formulation with regard to COP 15 (and how)? What were their main objectives with regard to national and international climate change policy and COP 15? Were these objectives met? What were their assessments of COP 15 in terms of the content of the policy that emerged and the processes by which it was formulated? The data suggests that the majority of those surveyed were able to articulate clear objectives and had taken steps to try to shape the policy but that a significant percentage were dissatisfied with the processes and outcome of COP 15. Many of the respondents recognised a business case for a low carbon economy and preferred a mode of governance that offers a well-designed, clear, and long-term policy and legislation for investment purposes. Many pointed to the deficiencies of the governance process but acknowledge the complexity of the issues and the difficultly of reconciling so many interests.