The total body of this work suggests that the likelihood of voluntary corporate action to protect
the environment is an interaction between three conditions (a) the external organizational environment
that makes proenvironmental action necessary, desirable, and legitimate, (b) the organization’s competitive position in that environment, and (c) the internal organizational members’ ability to
perceive financial and external pressures to act voluntarily and frame environmental action as an
opportunity for improving organizational survival. A firm is highly unlikely to act if it (a) would
actually lose competitive advantage, (b) faces little or no external pressure from its organizational
and institutional environment, and (c) has no internal champion for the action. The stronger the presence
of each one of these conditions is the more likely voluntary proenvironmental action is to occur.