International isomorphism, sustainable innovation and wealth for OECD cities

City memberships in international organizations such as C40 Cities may facilitate urban governance, sustainable innovation, and wealth. This study considers whether OECD cities benefit through sustainable innovations and transformative international memberships that promote the innovations. By exami...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of urban affairs Vol. 43; no. 9; pp. 1285 - 1309
Main Author de Lange, Deborah E.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Newark Routledge 21.10.2021
Taylor & Francis Ltd
Subjects
Cities
Context
Governance
Innovations
International organizations
Isomorphism
Natural environment
Policy making
Pollution
Sustainability
Urban areas
Wealth
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Summary:City memberships in international organizations such as C40 Cities may facilitate urban governance, sustainable innovation, and wealth. This study considers whether OECD cities benefit through sustainable innovations and transformative international memberships that promote the innovations. By examining these issues faced by many city policy makers, this work contributes to the sustainable urban governance literature. These issues are researched through an institutional theory lens to extend this theory of isomorphism to the international city context, where more commonly it is developed in a firm context. Findings show that cities investing in green space and innovation are wealthier, whereas cities with more pollution are less wealthy. Furthermore, international city memberships are related to wealth such that they inform the use of innovative capacity toward wealth-producing sustainable outcomes. Because city memberships produce forums where normative and mimetic pressures operate among cities to apply sustainable innovations, empirical support for institutional theory is found in the city context.
ISSN:0735-2166
1467-9906
DOI:10.1080/07352166.2020.1730698