Gender diversity and environmental activism: Gender discrimination or socialisation?
研究了女性高管角色与环境股东行动主义的关系，发现环境活动家更倾向于针对女性CEO兼董事长的公司提交提案，而女性CEO和CEO兼董事长在提案撤回阶段有积极影响，可能源于管理权力和女性社会化特质。
Abstract This paper empirically investigates the association between different executive roles taken by women and environmental shareholder activism at the shareholder proposal filing stage and the withdrawal stage. Building on gender socialisation theory and the managerial power perspective, and with 2350 firm‐year observations from Standard and Poor's (S&P) 1500 companies in the United States for the years 2010–2018, we find that environmental activists display a greater propensity to target firms led by women CEO–Chairs at the shareholder proposal filing stage, while no significant preference is observed towards general women directors or CEOs. To explore the rationale behind this preference—whether it stems from gender discrimination or socialisation—we extend our investigation to the withdrawal stage and identify a significantly positive influence from both women CEOs and CEO–Chairs, with the influence from CEO–Chairs being more pronounced. We postulate that both the managerial power and women's socialised traits (such as being more altruistic, collaborative and communicative) are plausible explanations for this gender effect, and women without substantial legitimate power in environmental matters are unable to exert a significant impact.