Apologies for Cross-Posting
CALL FOR PAPERS
SPECIAL ISSUE
BENCHMARKING: AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL
CORPORATE ENVIRONMENTAL BENCHMARKING
Over the previous decade businesses have felt increased pressure from
governments, communities, shareholders, non-governmental organizations, and
competitors on various natural environmental issues. Researchers and
practitioners have implemented and studied a number of reactive and
proactive measures to help organizations respond to these pressures. In
fact, many organizations have come to realize that organizational strategies
and practices that incorporate the natural environment can be a source of
competitive advantage. Studies in this area have focused on financial,
operations, marketing, labor, technological and strategic topics that
organizations are pursuing. Integral to the management of corporate
environmental practices is the use of benchmarking. Corporate environmental
benchmarking is becoming a major element in the environmental management of
organizations. With the advent of environmental reporting, mandatory and
voluntary reporting of environmental information, and ISO 14000 standards
based performance evaluation, and "traditional" environmental organizational
practices such as design for the environment and total quality environmental
management, the role of benchmarking becomes even more critical.
Management and researchers can benefit greatly from exposure to the state of
the art practices and research in Corporate Environmental Benchmarking.
Thus, we are providing a single source of information on these latest
practices and issues. We are looking for high quality papers and studies
that can be valuable to both the management and research communities. We
will not limit the type of papers since we are looking for a broad spectrum
of practice and research in this evolving area. We wish to include
conceptual and practical, applied studies including analytical, empirical
and methodological papers. Case studies are also welcome contributions.
The aim of this special issue is to cover a number of topical areas within
corporate environmental benchmarking. Examples of topics that could be
addressed in this special issue include, but are not limited to:
* Strategic Benchmarking -How organizations use environmental
benchmarking to determine long term development of competitive advantage
based on environmental issues. Integration of environmental with other
corporate goals, including other sustainability and social goals. Using
strategic environmental benchmarking data for research and evaluation of
corporate financial and market performance.
* Environmental benchmarking's role in decreased governmental
oversight of corporate environmental performance.
* The impact of the global reporting initiative and environmental
reporting on corporate environmental performance. This may include the
roles of internal and external benchmarking for managing environmental
performance of organizations.
* Tools and models for corporate environmental benchmarking including:
* Life Cycle Analysis's role
* Performance Analysis (gap analysis tools) e.g. eco-efficiency ratios
and measure
* Econometric models to evaluate the relative performance of
environmental programs.
* Frameworks for planning, design, implementation and maintenance of
environmental benchmarking data and practices.
* The role of benchmarking and performance measurement in total
quality environmental management and ISO 14001/14031 standards and
certification, including continuous improvement analysis.
* Using the Internet and other pervasive information technologies to
aid in benchmarking.
* The role of various governmental sources and programs to aid in
benchmarking and monitoring corporate environmental behavior.
* Environmental benchmarking practices across and within various
industrial sectors including manufacturing, service, agricultural, and
construction sectors.
The submissions will be peer reviewed with quick decisions made to meet the
deadlines for publication. Papers will be evaluated on their contribution,
suitability to the special issue, and overall quality. Authors should
closely follow the guidelines under "Notes to Contributors" of the
Benchmarking: An International Journal web site at
http://www.mcb.co.uk/bij.htm. Manuscripts will be peer reviewed based on
the standards of the journal. Electronic submissions using MS WORD for
Windows are encouraged, or four copies of the manuscript should be mailed to
the guest editor by September 30, 2001.
Professor Joseph Sarkis
Graduate School of Management
Clark University
950 Main Street
Worcester, MA 01610-1477
USA
Tel: (508) 793-7659
Fax: (508) 793-8822
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
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