Papers by Eefje de Gelder
Food Studies: Matter, Meaning & Movement, 2022
Business Ethics, the Environment & Responsibility
Review of Social Economy, 2019
This paper analyzes whether ideology-driven firms doing business based on ethical principles such... more This paper analyzes whether ideology-driven firms doing business based on ethical principles such as those envisioned by fair trade can survive in the market when competition increases. By formally evaluating the development of fair trade over time, we show that such firms cannot continue to exist with full compliance with ethical standards about fairness. We conceptualize fairness as wealth transfers to small local producers in developing countries and apply a Hotelling-model of horizontal competition in fairness. Results show that increasing the scale and scope of fair trade products in the market implies that concessions on fairness are needed to survive intensified competition. Ideology-driven fair trade firms will survive only if they differentiate. In the end, paradoxically, wealth transfers by ideology-driven firms can be upheld only by focusing on other attributes than fairness to attract consumers. Only then can ideology-driven firms maintain ethical standards in a market environment, while alleviating pressure on total wealth transfers to local producers.
This paper analyzes whether ideology-driven firms doing business based on ethical principles such... more This paper analyzes whether ideology-driven firms doing business based on ethical principles such as those envisioned by fair trade can survive in the market when competition increases. By formally evaluating the development of fair trade over time, we show that such firms cannot continue to exist with full compliance with ethical standards about fairness. We conceptualize fairness as wealth transfers to small local producers in developing countries and apply a Hotelling-model of horizontal competition in fairness. Results show that increasing the scale and scope of fair trade products in the market implies that concessions on fairness are needed to survive intensified competition. Ideology-driven fair trade firms will survive only if they differentiate. In the end, paradoxically, wealth transfers by ideology-driven firms can be upheld only by focusing on other attributes than fairness to attract consumers. Only then can ideology-driven firms maintain ethical standards in a market environment, while alleviating pressure on total wealth transfers to local producers.
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Papers by Eefje de Gelder