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Publication The interplay between environmental social governance (ESG) performance, access to finance and growth in unlisted firms: Evidence from Eastern Europe and Central Asia Region(Thesis, The University of Waikato, 2025)This thesis is designed as “thesis by publication” and consists of three research articles, which are at various stages of publication in high quality peer reviewed journals. Article 1 has been published in Business Strategy and the Environment, an ‘A’ ranked journal. Article 2 is currently under revise and resubmission stage with the International Journal of Auditing, which is also classified as an ‘A’ category journal. Article 3 has been submitted to the International Review of Economics and Finance, another journal with an ‘A’ ranking. The articles, which form the empirical component of the thesis, are presented in Chapters 4, 5 and 6. Article 1 examines the relationship between Environmental Social and Governance performance and Growth of Unlisted Firms. Article 2 investigates the relationship between ESG performance and Access to Finance of Unlisted Firms with interacting role of External Audit. Article 3 explores the relationship between Access to Finance and Growth of Unlisted Firms with the interacting role of ESG performance and Technological Innovation. These articles use data of unlisted firms of Eastern Europe and Central Asia. The three articles are supplemented by chapters 1, 2 3 and 7 to link the 3 articles as well as to provide a comprehensive presentation of the thesis. Chapter 1 provides an overview of the thesis followed by Literature Review in Chapter 2 and Methodology in Chapter 3. The thesis concludes with reflections in Chapter 7. Environmental, Social, and Governance performance is fundamental to a firm's long-term sustainability. The adoption of ESG practices aligns with the United Nations 2030 Agenda and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals, which highlight the importance of sustainability and encourage strategic thinking across various sectors including business. ESG performance of companies is becoming essential because now a days firms are expected not only to focus on financial performance but also to prioritise ESG considerations for sustainable growth. Investors increasingly seek companies that demonstrate long-term sustainability and financial stability. Creditors tend to favour firms that demonstrate sustainable practices, offering them better loan conditions, which in turn can drive the growth of unlisted firms. This study fills critical gaps in the existing literature on the relationship between ESG performance and firm growth, specifically for unlisted firms. Previous research has primarily focused on publicly listed firms when examining ESG impacts. However, unlisted firms contribute significantly to global GDP and employment and face unique financial constraints. Despite their economic significance, there is lack of studies that have explored how ESG practices influence their access to finance and growth, making this an important area for investigation. While ESG research has extensively examined topics (such as financial risk, firm performance, earnings management and reputation), there is limited understanding of the role of ESG in fostering firm growth in unlisted firms. Growth—measured in terms of sales, employment and asset expansion—is crucial for competitiveness, yet the connection between ESG performance and access to finance in driving firm growth remains largely unexplored, particularly in unlisted firms of emerging economies. Additionally, most ESG studies focus on developed economies such as the EU, the US, and China, while research on the Eastern Europe and Central Asia region remains limited. This region faces unique sustainability challenges including climate change, resource depletion, and pollution. Given EECA’s commitment to international agreements like the Paris Agreement, understanding the role of ESG adoption in firm growth and financial access is important in this context. There is lack of prior studies that have examined how ESG performance interacts with financial access by unlisted firms. This study investigates the impact of ESG performance on access to finance, and firm growth, while also considering the interacting role of external audit in enhancing credibility and reducing greenwashing risks. While stakeholder theory, signalling theory and legitimacy theory have been widely applied in ESG research, their application in the context of unlisted firms remains underexplored. This study highlights how ESG-driven firms can strengthen their legitimacy, secure financing and achieve sustainable growth by aligning with investor and societal expectations. By addressing these gaps, this research provides new insights into the role of ESG in fostering financial access and growth for unlisted firms, particularly in the under-researched EECA region. This thesis aims to examine three interrelated aspects of unlisted firms in the EECA region including: the impact of ESG performance on the growth of unlisted firms; the influence of ESG performance on firm’s Access to Finance with interacting role of External Audit, and the impact of access to finance on firm growth with interacting role of ESG and Technological Innovation. ESG is the primary theme of the thesis, providing an understanding of the interplay between ESG performance, access to finance and growth of unlisted firms in the EECA region. This research follows the positivist view of epistemology, objectivist ontology, and an unbiased axiology. In the positivist approach, researchers use existing theories to develop hypotheses, which are then tested, analysed, and either confirmed or refuted. This process helps to refine and expand theoretical understanding, allowing future researchers to further evaluate the findings empirically. The positivist perspective is particularly useful when a significant amount of existing research is available on the topic, enabling a systematic and objective investigation. This thesis follows a deductive approach, which is useful for developing research questions and hypotheses grounded in existing literature. The empirical relationships between independent and dependent variables across the three articles are analysed using quantitative data. The thesis uses data from the World Bank Enterprise Survey and employs Principal Component Analysis to develop the ESG index for the measurement of ESG performance. In article 1 and 3, 2SLS is applied to address endogeneity by using instrumental variables. Validity of instruments is checked by applying the Wald Test. In article 2, IV probit is used to address the endogeneity issue. The results suggest that prioritising ESG initiatives enable the management of unlisted firms to secure financing and leverage resources more effectively. ESG-focused firms tend to experience growth in financial (Sales, and Asset Growth) and nonfinancial (Employment Growth) terms. This highlights the crucial role of ESG performance in enabling unlisted firms to thrive in a competitive market with access to finance serving as a key enabler for growth. This study highlights the significance of ESG performance for unlisted firms in the EECA region, emphasising their role in resource optimisation, eco-friendly production, and addressing regional issues like pollution and biodiversity loss. Adopting ESG initiatives helps firms align with societal expectations, enhance their reputation, and drive sustainable growth. Beyond business benefits, ESG practices foster trust, community well-being, and stakeholder relationships, creating a positive impact on both firms and society. Strong governance ensures transparency, accountability, and long-term stability, strengthening credibility and resilience in economic challenges. The study underscores policymakers' role in crafting regulations that promote sustainability and in aligning with SDGs. Collaboration between governments, financial institutions, and businesses is essential to overcoming financial constraints and fostering economic resilience. By integrating ESG principles, firms can secure better financing, enhance competitiveness, and contribute to a more sustainable economy.Publication Deamination and hydrolysis of tertiary systems(Thesis, The University of Waikato, 1980)This thesis reports the aqueous nitrous acid deamination of two tertiary carbinamines; 2-amino-2-methylpropane and 3-amino-3-methylpentane (at 80°C, pH4). The hydrolysis (at 80°C, pH4) of the two corresponding alkyldimethyl sulphonium salts; dimethyl-(2-methyl-2-propyl) sulphonium perchlorate and dimethyl-(3-methyl-3-pentyl) sulphonium perchlorate, is also reported. A comparison of the two types of reaction (deamination and hydrolysis) shows small but definite differences. Both deaminations produced a greater proportion of elimination than the corresponding hydrolyses. The deamination of 3-amino-3-methylpentane produced lower 2-ene/1-ene and trans/cis ratios than the corresponding hydrolysis. It is suggested that the deamination carbocations are short-lived and shielding by the departing nitrogen prevents complete loss of the “excess” energy acquired from the irreversible decomposition of the diazonium ions. The “excess” energy of the deamination product precursors relative to the hydrolysis analogs makes the higher energy product-forming pathways more favourable in deamination than hydrolysis.Publication Some observations on the population dynamics of the Australian soldier fly Inopus Rubriceps Macquart (Diptera: Stratiomyidae)(Thesis, The University of Waikato, 1973)Inopus rubriceps (Macquart) is an indigenous Australian stratiomyid, whose subterranean larval stage has been recorded as a pest of sugar cane and pastures in Queensland for some time (Saunders 1963 and Hitchcock 1970). I. rubriceps has been known in New Zealand since the early 1940’s (Muggeridge 1944), but it was not until the late 1960’s that the N.Z. Department of Agriculture, under considerable pressure from the farming community, finally decided to initiate research work on this insect. The present writer was employed by the Department to commence work on the development of a pest management programme to be used in a pasture agro-ecosystem. At that time, there was an almost complete lack of knowledge about any aspect of the insect’s biology and ecology under N.Z. pasture conditions. The above, together with the failure to find a suitable chemical control from several insecticidal screening trials (Hewitt 1964) precluded, at least initially, any worthwhile work on direct control methods. Clark et al (1967) have argued that in those cases where no prior hypotheses can be made about an insect, the development of life tables provides much of the background biological and ecological information needed to put the development of control measures on a rational basis. Thus, the main aim of this work was to test the feasibility of developing life tables for the Australian soldier fly, under pasture conditions.Publication A study of knot-graphs(Thesis, The University of Waikato, 1984)This thesis is an account of studies made of knot projections, the tools used being graph-theoretic methods and extensions of them. The basic tool is the adjacency matrix. In fact several kinds of adjacency matrix are defined, for knot diagrams which are either nonoriented or are given orientations which reflect certain topological properties of the knots concerned. First the properties of knot-graph adjacency matrices are studied. In particular, a matrix equation is derived which is shown to be satisfied by the α- and β-adjacency matrices of all knot-graphs; other matrices appearing in the equation are studied. Examination of types of walk that can be made on a knot-graph leads to a definition of walk-groups and groupoids on knot-graphs. Relations between the Cayley diagrams of walk-groups and certain other knots which are derived from the diagrams lead to interesting correspondences between knots, both finite and infinite. An extensive study of the spectra of knot-graph adjacency matrices is presented. Methods for obtaining spectra are given, both for general cases and for certain classes of knots. The concept of balanced orientations of knot-graphs is introduced; and numbers of rooted directed spanning trees of oriented knot-graphs are studied. It is shown that one type of tree number is a knot invariant, and evidence for the invariance of another one is given. A general inequality relating the two types of number is conjectured. The first tree number has several topological interpretations, and these are discussed. Tables of the numbers are given for knots of orders n = 3, ... ,10; and methods for calculating them for various knot classes are developed. A vertex deletion theorem relating tree numbers of three knot-graphs is proved. Families of twins which arise from vertex deletions in knot-graphs are defined and studied. It is shown that by repeatedly applying the deletion operation on a given alternating knot-graph, one is led to a certain distribution of ‘twists’, which is given the name ‘twist spectrum’. Twist spectra have many interesting topological properties: they are topological invariants, and their moments are powerful knot discriminants; they distinguish between a knot-graph and its mirror image and hence can be used to investigate amphicheirality. The twist spectra for prime alternating 1-links up to order n = 9 and for 2- links up to order n = 8 are tabulated. A general algorithm for computing a twist spectrum is given, and formulae are obtained for twist spectra of members of certain knot-classes.Publication The reception of Grabbe’s Hannibal in the German theatre(Thesis, The University of Waikato, 1980)This study has undertaken to investigate the reception of Christian Dietrich Grabbe’s tragedy, Hannibal, in the German theatre. Before the main topic could be approached, an outline needed to be provided in an expositional part of the genesis of the drama and the history of its publication; for the appearance and publication of the text marks the beginning of any reception process. The thesis is divided into two major parts. The first deals with the adaptations of the drama, prepared with theatrical portrayal in mind. These act as a bridge between the original text and its realization in the theatre. The second part is devoted to the productions as seen mainly through the eyes of theatre critics who are able to give some permanence to a transitory experience by capturing it in writing. Between 1901 and 1940, there were five printed adaptations of Hannibal: those of Spielmann (1901), Kilian (1919), Jessner (1926), Martin (1940), and Haas (1940). The adaptors themselves were recipients and created examples of productive reception which were able to be passed on to the public by way of the theatre. The adaptors all encountered similar problems when confronted with Grabbe’s original, and to make the drama suitable for the stage, the structure had to be modified, lists of dramatis personae given and stage directions altered or added. A sixth adaptation was that of Brecht who began to prepare it for the Deutsches Theater, Berlin. It remained a fragment but shows that he wished to diverge from, rather than conform to, the original. The adaptations performed were those of Kilian, Jessner, Martin, and Haas. The productions of Hannibal spanned the period from 1916 till 1958, after which time the tragedy seems to have been ignored by the German theatre. The main aim of this part is to make use of critiques as a method of obtaining an impression of individual presentations and any special tendencies in interpretation and particular dramaturgical problems or trends. Apart from the 1916 portrayal, the productions have been arranged into three groups: those from 1918 to 1932, 1933 to 1945, and 1946 to the present day. From each group, two major productions have been regarded closely. Further productions have been dealt with more briefly at the end of each section. Receptive comments reveal that the presentations were usually understood in the context of the political, ideological, or philosophical climate of the time. The work placed enormous strains on the theatre. Innovative technological solutions had to be found to ensure fluency of action, and an outstanding actor was required for the title hero who was played by some of the greatest actors on the German stage: Steinrueck, Krauss, George, Meinecke, Schieske, and Zeidler. Whilst the drama was played on a number of occasions during the 1920s, it experienced its heyday in the theatre in the Nazi period and appeared at National Socialist festivals held in honour of the dramatist. Grabbe was repudiated in the years immediately after the war and the revival of interest in Hannibal in the 1950s was shown to be limited and apparently short-lived. To give a visual aid to the reader, I have included documentation at the end of my thesis in the form of a table of all productions, a play-bill for each of the six major ones, and photos of stage settings and leading and supporting actors.
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