Decarbonization Boundary Choices and the Effectiveness of Stakeholder Engagement in Voluntary Climate Action Commitments: Evidence From Emerging Economies

ABSTRACT This study examines how stakeholder engagement, conceptualized as a boundary‐spanning organizational capability, interacts with firms' decarbonization strategies, in relation to climate action commitments (CACs) in voluntary initiatives. Drawing on cross‐firm regression analyses of 98 Colombian firms, the results show that stakeholder engagement is positively associated with CAC. Decarbonization insourcing (DIN) also contributes directly to CAC and positively moderates the relationship between stakeholder engagement and CAC. By contrast, although Decarbonization outsourcing (DOU) is positively related to CAC in direct terms, it negatively moderates that relationship in the emerging‐economy context examined. By integrating the resource‐based view and stakeholder theory, we show that decarbonization boundary choices condition the effectiveness of stakeholder engagement and position stakeholders not only as sources of normative pressure but also as contributors to capability development. Overall, the findings indicate that the effectiveness of stakeholder engagement depends on how firms organize decarbonization across organizational boundaries and on the organizational and governance conditions required to translate stakeholder inputs into credible CACs.