How do external regulations shape the design of ethical tools in organisations? An open polity and sociology of compliance perspective
通过对四家跨国公司23个伦理工具开发过程的质性研究，提出了一个三阶段模型（引入、政治化、法律化），解释外部监管如何以自我强化的方式影响伦理工具的设计，对关注企业伦理合规的学者和管理者具有参考价值。
In response to the numerous hard and soft ethical regulations that have emerged in the wake of recurrent corporate scandals, Multinational Corporations (MNCs) have adopted ethical tools. This move is often interpreted as a means to garner legitimacy and as loosely coupled to corporate activities. Little is known, however, about the processes by which external regulations affect the design of ethical tools. Approaching organisations as open polities and building on institutional theory and the sociology of compliance, we conducted a qualitative study of the development of 23 ethical tools at four MNCs. We analytically induced a three-stage model that explains how ethical tools are externally sourced (importation), then subjected to competing pressures from distinct professional groups that replicate legal features of the environment (politicisation), to become finally turned into quasi-legal procedures (legalisation). Our analysis contributes to theory by explaining how external regulations relate to the organisational production of ethical tools in a self-reinforcing manner, while specifying the role of ethics professionals in the process of ethical tool production.