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Emerging technologies provide new opportunities for organizations but also introduce uncertainty and ambiguity about future developments. One specific risk that firms encounter in the prospective sensemaking process is the failure to adequately judge their potential impact on the organization, if they rely heavily on existing beliefs about the future or the industry. This study explores how opening up the strategy process (through a collaboration of companies from various industries) influences the way actors interpret and make sense of ambiguous and uncertain environments caused by blockchain technology. We recognized that this cross-industry, prospective sensemaking approach played a noticeable role in the way actors interpreted and reflected on technological change. The diversity of perspectives was framed by the participants as conducive to out-of-the-box thinking and to develop new frames and mental models. In various social and discursive processes, new meanings and application possibilities for the own company were developed. Due to the cross-industry approach (without competitors), an open learning climate could evolve, intracompany power struggles were prevented and there was no need to develop a ‘common sense’, which facilitated adopting a wide variety of perspectives and thinking in scenarios. Moreover, it was found that skilful facilitators played an important role in initiating and accompanying the sensemaking process.

Key biodiversity areas (KBAs) are critical regions for preserving global biodiversity. KBAs are identified by their importance to biodiversity rather than their legal status. As such, KBAs are often under pressure from human activities. KBAs can encompass many different land-use types (e.g., cropland, pastures) and land-use intensities. Here, we combine a global economic model with spatial mapping to estimate the biodiversity impacts of human land use in KBAs. We find that global human land use within KBAs causes disproportionate biodiversity losses. While land use within KBAs accounts for only 7% of total land use, it causes 16% of the potential global plant loss and 12% of the potential global vertebrate loss. The consumption of animal products accounts for more than half of biodiversity loss within KBAs, with housing the second largest at around 10%. Bovine meat is the largest single contributor to this loss, at around 31% of total biodiversity loss. In terms of land use, lightly grazed pasture contributes the most, accounting for around half of all potential species loss. This loss is concentrated mainly in middle- and low-income regions with rich biodiversity. International trade is an important driver of loss, accounting for 22-29% of total potential plant and vertebrate loss. Our comprehensive global, trade-linked analysis provides insights into maintaining the integrity of KBAs and global biodiversity.

Climate shocks to food systems have been thoroughly researched in terms of food security and supply chain management. However, sparse research exists on the dependent nature of climate shocks on food-producing breadbasket regions and their subsequent cascading impacts. In this paper, we propose that a copula approach, combined with a multilayer network and an agent-based model, can give important insights on how tail-dependent shocks can impact food systems. We show how such shocks can potentially cascade within a region through the behavioral interactions of various layers. Based on our suggested framework, we set up a model for India and show that risks due to drought events multiply if tail dependencies during extremes drought is explicitly taken into account. We further demonstrate that the risk is exacerbated if displacement also takes place. In order to quantify the spatial–temporal evolution of climate risks, we introduce a new measure of multilayer vulnerability that we term Vulnerability Rank or VRank. We find that with higher food production losses, the number of agents that are affected increases nonlinearly due to cascading effects in different network layers. These effects spread to the unaffected regions via large-scale displacement causing sudden changes in production, employment and consumption decisions. Thus, demand shifts also force supply-side adjustments of food networks in the months following the climate shock. We suggest that our framework can provide a more accurate picture of food security-related systemic risks caused by multiple breadbasket failures which, in turn, can better inform risk management and humanitarian aid strategies.

This article advances Rodrik's political trilemma of the world economy by using insights from Polanyi’s The Great Transformation, which helps to grasp the interwoven dynamics of long-term transformations due to climate change and geopolitical reordering on one hand, and on the other short-term political ruptures due to countermovements. Rodrik's globalization trilemma shows the incompatibility of hyperglobalization with the need for an enlarged democratic policy space. Its nodes (globalization, nation state and democracy), however, have to be redefined to grasp contemporary dynamics of deglobalization. Based on a modified political trilemma of contemporary social-ecological transformation, I discuss and compare three visions and the resultant strategies: (1) Liberal globalism, focusing on hyperglobalization and individualism, (2) nationalistic capitalism, stressing national sovereignty and authoritarian governance, and (3) foundational economy based on planetary coexistence which combines selective economic deglobalization with a strengthening of a place-based foundational economy, and their respective social-ecological infrastructural configurations.

The Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs) are at the forefront of climate change science today. As an influential methodology and method, the SSPs guide the framing of numerous climate change research questions and how these are investigated. Although the SSPs were developed by an interdisciplinary group of scientists in a well-documented process, there is no apparent consensus in the literature that answers the question, "What is the philosophy of science behind the SSPs?" To investigate, the paper applies a systematic thematic qualitative content analysis to the dataset of published papers that establish the rules and expectations for using the SSPs. The research determines that there is no obvious and concise statement on the epistemological and ontological foundation of the SSPs. However, based on the evidence identified in the dataset, SSPs are implicitly, though not explicitly, consistent with a critical realist and concrete utopian philosophy as coined by Roy Bhaskar. This is the first paper to discuss the philosophical underpinning of the SSPs.

Growing urbanization and rising urban freight volumes contribute to increasing congestion, noise and pollution which negatively impact a city’s population. City hubs are one means of mitigating this problem by consolidating goods of different suppliers at the hub and cooperating in the last mile delivery. Because of the general shortage of urban space, a major challenge is finding an appropriate location for such a hub. This paper provides a decision support tool based on the analytic hierarchy process for the hub location selection problem, which considers quantitative and qualitative criteria. By involving three stakeholder groups – the municipality, logistics companies and citizens – the approach insures a comprehensive view. The application of the model is tested for the location selection of a midi-hub – a medium-sized city hub – in Vienna. Hence, our results show that a good compromise between different stakeholder views regarding a mid-hub location selection problem can be achieved by the application of our AHP-based decision support tool.

Human demand for adequate water resources and supplies has been and will continue to be a fundamental issue in the 21st century due to rapid population growth, growing economies and globalization, and increasing water pollution, among others. Water withdrawals in regions which are already encountering scarcity will impose intensifying pressure on water resources locally and globally, threatening the achievement of long-term sustainable development targets. Decoupling has increasingly been recognized and incorporated in policy making as a way to reconcile limitless economic growth with environmental pressures. Filling evident literature gaps, the current state and projected future decoupling factors of water withdrawals in relation to GDP are assessed through decoupling and regression analyzes for 155 countries and 12 potential socioeconomic development pathway scenarios. Findings suggest that average levels of water withdrawal decoupling are moderate in 2025 but will increase throughout the century in all countries. By 2075, average water withdrawal decoupling becomes common and widespread, with high decoupling factors across the world. Yet, some countries and regions will continue to lag behind in this development. GDP growth is the most significant driver of water withdrawals. Climate and regional differences among countries are major influential factors on decoupling outcomes, more so than current country-level income group classification. Altogether, these results are of high significance to water resource managers and policy actors, offering a chance to act proactively to change the course on global water resource and country-specific development. In this way, decoupling provides a pathway to a more water-wise world.

PurposeA perceived misalignment between socially responsible fans and football club management has recently led to a major crisis during the annual meeting in 2021 of Bayern Munich, one of the largest professional football teams in Europe. In an unprecedented scenario, Bayern Munich fans demanded that management drop one of its largest sponsors due to alleged violation of human rights. The goal of this paper is to examine this particular phenomenon, as it not only demonstrates a discrepancy between the social organizational identity and its image, but more importantly, how it impacts legitimation strategies and the fans' loyalty attitudes towards the club.Design/methodology/approachUsing the underlying concepts of legitimacy and loyalty, this conceptual model paper proposes two frameworks for social responsibility in professional football clubs: (1) analyzing how the (mis-)alignment between organizational identity and image impacts fan loyalty and (2) depicting four different types of social responsibility strategies to align organizational identity and image.FindingsThe authors identify various theoretical concepts that influence organizational identity and image in and for social responsibility and combine the two critical concepts of legitimacy and loyalty to categorize the social responsibility strategies for professional football clubs.Originality/valueBoth frameworks advance the understanding of the decision-making behind social responsibility strategies and also synthesize the current literature to offer conceptual clarity regarding the varied implications and outcomes linked to the misalignment between organizational identity and image.

This is a preprint prior to formal peer review. The final version of the manuscript was published in Nature Food in 2022:https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-021-00431-5

Lacking systematic supply-use information of agricultural biomass and food products within China makes the existing provincial environmental pressure assessments (e.g., water consumption) either not detailed enough (e. g., by the input-output table-based approach) or not comprehensive enough (e.g., by the process-based approach). This study develops a symmetric inter-provincial multiregional input-output (MRIO) model that hybridizes the physical food and agricultural biomass system with the monetary supply chain of China. First, we construct the inter-provincial supply, use, and input-output tables in physical units of 84 agriculture, food and forestry products. These physical supply/use/MRIO tables systematically capture agrifood product flows, at an unprecedented level of product detail, along domestic supply chains within China. Then we integrate the physical MRIO table of agrifood products into the monetary all-sector MRIO table to construct a symmetric hybrid MRIO table of China. The application of our hybrid MRIO model to the case of provincial blue water footprint assessments reveals that the hybrid model enhances both the monetary MRIO table-based approach and the process-based approach from different aspects. For instance, the hybrid MRIO model can reduce the uncertainty of monetary MRIO modeling due to the aggregation of products with different environmental properties into homogeneous sectors. Lastly, uncertainty analysis is implemented to quantify the main sources of uncertainties, and understand the reliability of our new hybrid MRIO model for future sustainable development design.

The paper combines grid-level data of eight emission types –CO2, N20, CH4, NH3, NOX, PM10, PM2.5, and SO2 – with sub-national economic data to create a 1995–2015 balanced panel for NUTS 2 regions in EU countries. Regions on average show decoupling of emissions from output but most of the emission reductions are achieved before the 2008 financial crisis. Post 2008, very weak decoupling and even coupling can be observed. Using OECD’s Environmental Policy Stringency (EPS) Index as an intervention variable, an event study analysis shows that strong policies significantly reduce emissions, but there is considerable heterogeneity in the response by emission types and regional income levels.

Harvested biomass is linked to final consumption by networks of processes and actors that convert and distribute food and nonfood goods. Achieving a sustainable resource metabolism of the economy is an overarching challenge which manifests itself in a number of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Modeling the physical dimensions of biomass conversion and distribution networks is essential to understanding the characteristics, drivers, and dynamics of the socio-economic biomass metabolism. In this paper, we present the Food and Agriculture Biomass Input–Output model (FABIO), a set of multiregional supply, use and input–output tables in physical units, that document the complex flows of agricultural and food products in the global economy. The model assembles FAOSTAT statistics reporting crop production, trade, and utilization in physical units, supplemented by data on technical and metabolic conversion efficiencies, into a consistent, balanced, input–output framework. FABIO covers 191 countries and 130 agriculture, food and forestry products from 1986 to 2013. The physical supply use tables offered by FABIO provide a comprehensive, transparent, and flexible structure for organizing data representing flows of materials within metabolic networks. They allow tracing of biomass flows and embodied environmental pressures along global supply chains at an unprecedented level of product and country detail and can help to answer a range of questions regarding environment, agriculture, and trade. Here we apply FABIO to the case of cropland footprints and show the evolution of consumption-based cropland demand in China, the E.U., and the U.S.A. for plant-based and livestock-based food and nonfood products.

The long-lived, culturally relevant, and unique buildings of Europe’s urban landscapes embody the values of the circular economy (CE) and sustainability. They are central to urban identities, generation after generation. Furthermore, adaptive reuse of cultural heritage buildings (ARCH) contributes to slowing down the extraction of natural resources, reducing energy for new buildings, and reducing construction and demolition waste and greenhouse gas emissions. ARCH’s inherent characteristics distinctly express the 2019 European Green Deal’s CE objectives and the 2020 building Renovation Wave Strategy. In this context, European city managers, heritage conservationists, and other stakeholders need a systematic method to characterize the investment opportunity for ARCH, considering CE. To fill this methodological gap, this study introduces a new composite indicator called the Circular City Adaptive Reuse of Cultural Heritage Index.&nbsp

Current urban city logistics literature often claims that rising e-commerce and the associated courier-, express- and parcel- (CEP) deliveries are inherently responsible for the increase in urban road traffic and the related congestion, disturbances and delays within cities. However, existing research is so far limited concerning studies to what extent CEPs impact and contribute to urban road traffic, particularly in comparison with other commercial sectors and passenger cars. In response, collecting data through an extensive empirical survey, counting urban road traffic in the city of Vienna in Austria, this paper identifies the share of CEPs and other selected categories of road vehicles. Results show that the share of CEPs in urban road traffic consists of merely 0.8 per cent, while the delivery vans’ share of craftsmen/technicians is almost eight times bigger with 6.0 per cent. Overall, delivery vehicles comprise 13.5 per cent of the total urban road traffic in Vienna, thus policies to reduce traffic should include not only other commercial sectors, but should also focus on passenger cars comprising the majority with 86.5 per cent of total urban road traffic. This is the first study that specifically investigates the share of CEPs and other vehicle categories in the context of city logistics.

This Tracker presents data on daily COVID-19 cases at the sub-national level for 26 European countries from January 2020 till present. Country-level data sources are identified and processed to form a homogenized panel at the NUTS 3 or NUTS 2 level, the two lowest standardized administrative units in Europe. The strengths and weaknesses of each country dataset are discussed in detail. The raw data, spatial layers, the code, and the final homogenized files are provided in an online repository for replication. The data highlights the spatial distribution of cases both within and across countries that can be utilized for a disaggregated analysis on the impacts of the pandemic. The Tracker is updated monthly to expand its coverage.

Agricultural production is one of the largest contributors to global greenhouse gas emissions. High-income countries like Austria source large quantities of feed, food and nonfood crops abroad thereby outsourcing emissions. Understanding global supply chains and geographical patterns of the trade with agricultural products is crucial for taking on responsibility for consumption-based emissions arising in other world regions. This study investigates Austria’s carbon footprint capturing all emissions from global agriculture associated with the consumption of food and non-food products. The analysis gives detailed insights into the contribution of various products and product categories, countries and regions, and carbon emitting processes across global supply chains, while comprehensively capturing all products consumed in Austria including their upstream emissions. The results show that while emission sources vary considerably for different consumption products, animal-based products account for the major part of emissions across the source regions. About 64% of Austrian emissions related to Austria’s carbon footprint of food products occur outside Austrian borders. Most emissions origin in Austria itself (36%), the rest of Europe (22%) and Asia (19%) and Latin America (14%). More than two thirds of emissions are related to the consumption of meat and other animal-based products. The results show the importance of consumption patterns, especially of meat and other animal products, for the Austrian footprint, which implies a great reduction potential through alternative diets and indicates clear limitations for emission mitigation strategies that instead focus on production efficiency.

Purpose While corporate social responsibility (CSR) standards are amongst the most widely adopted instruments for supporting firms in becoming more accountable, firms who adopt them frequently fail to comply. In this context, the purpose of this study is to explore to what extent CSR standards are designed for accountability. In the analysis, this paper investigates design characteristics related to accountability across different standard types, namely, principle-based, reporting, certification and process standards. Design/methodology/approach This study reviews the design characteristics of 50 CSR standards in a systematic and comparative fashion. This paper combines qualitative deductive coding with exploratory quantitative analyses methods to elucidate structural variance and patterns of accountability-related design characteristics across the sample. Findings This study finds that the prevalence of design characteristics aimed at fostering accountability varies significantly between different types of standards. This paper identifies three factors related to the specific purpose of any given standard that explain this structural variation in design characteristics, namely, implementability, comparability and measurability. Practical implications Non-compliance limits the effectiveness and legitimacy of CSR standards. The systematic exploration of patterns and structural variation in design characteristics that promote accountability may provide valuable clues for the design of more effective CSR standards in the future. Social implications Better understanding the role of design characteristics of CSR standards is critical to ensure they contribute to greater corporate accountability. Originality/value This study strives to expand the current understanding of the design characteristics of CSR standards beyond individual cases through a systematic exploration of accountability-related design characteristics across a larger sample.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to provide new insights into the reactions and lessons learned with regard to the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of how logistics service providers (LSPs) managed to maintain supply chains resilience and what focus areas have been changed to keep operations functional and uphold financial stability. Design/methodology/approach Based on data-gathering techniques in interpretive research this study collected primary data via semi-structured interviews, interviewing informants from selected LSPs that operate on a global scale. Findings The results show that LSPs have built their reactions and actions to the COVID-19 outbreak around five main themes: “create revenue streams,” “enhance operational transport flexibility,” “enforce digitalization and data management,” “optimize logistics infrastructure” and “optimize personnel capacity.” These pillars build the foundation to LSP resilience that enables supply chains to stay resilient during an external shock of high impact and low probability. Originality/value The results of this study provide insights into how LSPs have managed the downsides and found innovative ways to overcome operational and financial challenges during the COVID-19 outbreak. As one of the first studies that specially focuses on the role of LSPs during the COVID-19 pandemic, this study categorizes the LSPs’ reactions and provides a “lessons learned” framework from a managerial perspective. From a theoretical perspective, this paper discusses the strategic role of LSPs in supply chain management and thereby extends current supply chain literature with a focus on LSP resilience.

The growth in e-commerce has led to increased pressure within the courier, express and parcel (CEP) sector to tackle the ‘last-mile’ issue and come up with solutions that not only satisfy the customers, but also other stakeholders such as city councils and other regulatory bodies. Scholars have highlighted micro-hubs and the associated horizontal collaboration as a possible solution, which might help alleviate problems associated with last-mile logistics in inner-city centers. However, trust and data exchange issues are considerable barriers to the introduction of horizontal collaboration, in particular between CEP carriers. To address the lack of trust and the issue of data exchange between carriers, the use of blockchain technology may present a solution, but existing research so far is limited concerning frameworks that specifically discuss blockchain technology in the context of micro-hubs and last-mile deliveries. In response, this paper presents a blockchain decision framework for a horizontal collaboration between CEP carriers based on key characteristics of existing blockchain decision models and relevant related research in the area of logistics and last-mile distribution. This is the first study that specifically addresses the use of blockchain technology for horizontal collaboration in the context of micro-hubs and last-mile deliveries.

Research/Case problem: How can quality of living and environmentally friendly mobility choices be facilitated, improved and measured in an era of urbanization? Chapter overview (case synopsis) Recent global rankings recognize Vienna as top ranked city in terms of its quality of living. This case shows that progressive environmental policy settings and innovative internal marketing are drivers to leverage opportunities that arise from a favorable international reputation. The case then describes Vienna’s success in shifting the travel mode choices of its residents, especially with the introduction of an affordable “365 Euro annual pass” for its entire public transport network. Changing individuals’ transport choice and behavior is a key component toward achieving climate targets and creating desirable urban environments. The widespread adoption of the innovative offering to access public transport benefits organizations and businesses operating in the city is exemplified by the largest Austrian football club, Rapid Vienna, and original data of fan mobility.

This paper is the first in-depth review of the state of the art of environmental impact indicators for adaptive reuse of cultural heritage (ARCH) buildings from a circular economy perspective. Buildings are a necessary component of sustainability planning because they are significant consumers of natural resources, producers of construction and demolition waste, and contributors to greenhouse gas emissions. In addition, buildings, particularly ARCH buildings, are long lasting; therefore, measuring and managing their environmental impacts is crucial to achieving the universal vision of a sustainable, low-carbon economy. The research answers the questions, ‘What are the environmental impact indicators used by individual ARCH building project analyses?’ and ‘Are the most commonly used indicators reflecting Circular Economy concepts?’ It synthesizes and defines current practice in the field whilst highlighting the gaps between practice and policy. Although the term ‘Circular Economy’ is not explicitly and routinely used in the literature, related concepts such as life cycle analysis, energy consumption reduction, energy efficiency, and embodied carbon/energy are evident at the project level. Concrete and measured environmental indicators are not mainstream. However, narratives of environmental protection feature prominently in the literature, indicating an environmental motivation for repurposing cultural heritage buildings. Further, there is a gap between common indicators of circularity and the ARCH building project level indicators shown in the dataset.

der Fall des WU Professors Sebastian Kummer sorgte im Frühjahr 2020 für Schlagzeilen. Mitte Februar war der Segler mit Freunden an der französischen Atlantikküste aufgebrochen, um einen Katamaran in die Türkei zu überführen. Dann kam Corona und die Crew ging. Ab Mallorca ist Kummer allein an Bord. Ein Land nach dem anderen schließt die Grenzen. Italien, Griechenland und kurz vor dem Ziel auch die Türkei. Die komplette Mittelmeerküste wird zur roten Zone. Einreiseverbot! Der Institutsleiter an der Wiener Wirtschaftsuniversität darf kein Land mehr ansteuern, ist Wind und Wetter ausgesetzt. In Griechenland treibt die Küstenwache den 57-Jährigen mit vorgehaltener Maschinenpistole aus einer sicheren Bucht in die dunkle Nacht. In der Türkei versteckt sich Kummer wochenlang in einsamen Buchten, die er sein „Niemandsland“ nennt. Der Professor ist zum Piraten geworden. Kummer nimmt sein Schicksal an. Mit grenzenlosem Optimismus und einer großen Portion Selbstironie erlebt er die „schönste Quarantäne der Welt“ (O-Ton Kummer). Aus seinem Versteck gibt er Zeitungen und Magazinen, Radiostationen und TV-Sendern Interviews. In der Türkei schafft er es auf die Titelseite der „Hürriyet“. Immer wieder bahnen sich Lösungen an, immer wieder scheitert die Einreise. Dann meldet sich ein mysteriöser türkisch-österreichischer Geschäftsmann bei dem Segler. Er kann Kummer angeblich aus seiner misslichen Situation befreien. Ein Scharlatan oder der Retter in der Not? Die Türkei, wirtschaftlich am Boden, buhlt um deutsche Touristen, sobald die Einreisebeschränkungen fallen. Doch Berlin stellt sich quer. Der deutsche Segler, der sich irgendwo in türkischen Gewässern versteckt, wird zum Politikum.

Inequalities are extending their scope in the wrong direction, impacting such dimensions as health care, quality education or safety in the way of living. The Sustainable Development Goal 10 “Reduced Inequalities” aims to establish equality among nations and within countries themselves. At the same time, technology and information systems have rapidly been integrated in our daily life during the previous decade and will continue to gain significant attention due to approaches such as artificial intelligence or deep learning. This matter under concern does not only affect individuals and communities but also businesses and economies on a global scale. Hence, this paper will take in hand the connection between information systems and the progress towards sustainable development with a particular emphasis on inequalities in developing countries.

Circular economy strategies seek to reduce the total resources extracted from the environment and reduce the wastes that human activities generate in pursuit of human wellbeing. Circular Economy concepts are well suited to the building and construction sector in cities. For example, refurbishing and adaptively reusing underutilized or abandoned buildings can revitalize neighborhoods whilst achieving environmental benefits. Cultural heritage buildings hold a unique niche in the urban landscape. In addition to shelter, they embody the local cultural and historic characteristics that define communities. Therefore, extending their useful lifespan has multiple benefits that extend beyond the project itself to the surrounding area, contributing to economic and social development. To explore this complex issue, the research applies systematic literature review and synthesis methods. Decision makers lack knowledge of the environmental benefits of adaptive reuse of cultural heritage buildings and lack tools to implement these projects. A new comprehensive circular economy framework for the adaptive reuse of cultural heritage buildings to reduce environmental impacts intends to meet these needs. The framework integrates methods and techniques from the building and construction literature that aim to reduce lifecycle environmental impact of buildings with a circular product supply chain approach.

Auf eine komprimierte Einführung in wesentliche Grundbegriffe und die Verwendung von Modellen in der Finanzwirtschaft folgen Grundlagen der Finanzmathematik (Zinsen- und Rentenrechnung). Im Abschnitt Investitionsrechnung liegt der Schwerpunkt auf dynamischen Investitionsrechenverfahren und deren Zusammenhang; im Bereich Finanzierung sind kurz- und langfristige Fremdfinanzierung sowie Beteiligungsfinanzierung und Kreditsubstitute wesentliche Themen. Ein Überblick über wichtige Finanzinstitutionen und eine fundierte Einführung in derivative Finanzprodukte runden das Buch ab. Zahlreiche in den Text integrierte Beispiele veranschaulichen die theoretischen Zusammenhänge, eine Vielzahl von Übungsaufgaben samt Lösungen ermöglicht eine Festigung des Gelernten samt effizienter Selbstkontrolle des Lernfortschritts.

Information provision is only an effective behaviour‐change strategy if the information is credible. A novel programme augments conventional hygiene instruction by showing participants everyday microbes under a microscope. Through a randomised evaluation in Pakistan, we show that this programme leads to meaningful hygiene and health improvements, while instruction alone does not. Traditional medicine, which offers an alternative disease model, may undermine learning by strengthening prior beliefs about hygiene. We show that believers in traditional medicine have smaller impacts, suggesting that traditional and modern medical beliefs are substitutes and that traditional medicine may exacerbate the infectious disease burden in this context.

The literature on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is rich in historical evidence explaining its rise, development, and global diffusion. Very few studies, however, have tried to forecast its future. Hence, the aim of this study is to explore the expected future role of CSR in Europe. To achieve this objective, we apply the Delphi method, an interactive forecasting technique based on the opinions of experts. Drawing upon the opinions of more than 500 experts representing 32 European countries and five economic sectors, the study concludes that the role of CSR will increase in the near future years, although the importance of this projection might differ among European macro-regions and sectors. We also examine the role of public CSR policies as well as different stakeholder groups in stimulating greater CSR involvement among companies. We show that among public CSR policies, the most important will be public procurement, subsidies and tax incentives, and CSR reporting standards. As for groups, the most prominent role in mobilising the socially responsible corporate behaviour will be played by business stakeholders, public authorities, and non-governmental organisations (NGOs).

This paper presents a post-Keynesian ecological macro model that combines three strands of literature: the directed technological change mechanism developed in mainstream endogenous growth theory models, the ecological economic literature which highlights the role of green innovation and material flows, and the post-Keynesian school which provides a framework to deal with the demand side of the economy, financial flows, and inter- and intra-sectoral behavioral interactions. The model is stock-flow consistent and introduces research and development (R&D) as a component of GDP funded by private firm investment and public expenditure. The economy uses three complimentary inputs - Labor, Capital, and (non-renewable) Resources. Input productivities depend on RD a Resource tax increase, and an increase in the share of public R&D on Resources. Model results show that policy instruments that are continually increased over a long-time horizon have better chances of achieving a "green" transition than one-of climate policy shocks to the system, that primarily have a short-run affect.

While corporate sustainability management research in universities has contributed to a greater understanding of sustainability, its current form has limited capacity to make a meaningful impact outside of academia. When it comes to the structures and concepts on which corporate sustainability management research is built, previous research has focused on inadequate principles and has been driven by a system that neglects solutions for real-word problems. This paper identifies four critical challenges that need to be addressed to reach the point of linking corporate sustainability management research with science and industry. This article argues that the normative foundation of universities together with the need for practical outcomes can drive corporate sustainability management research to bridge the gap between science and businesses. Consequently, this paper proposes four practical solutions which can help to build a bridge between science and businesses and offer the opportunity to develop long-term, participatory, solution-oriented projects as platforms for the next generation of corporate sustainability management researchers to engage in real-world problems and approaches in the field.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is now widely seen as an increasingly significant concern for firms because of moral, relational and instrumental motives. Nevertheless, practical aspects and challenges associated with CSR development in firms remains only partially understood. In this setting, the organizational learning (OL) discipline is recurrently put forward as key in the pursuit and successful development of CSR, but the existing literature remains disjointed. This study critically reviews the existing literature to conceptualize how research to date has approached CSR development in terms of OL, and to provide a two‐dimensional structuring framework of the role of OL in CSR development that emphasizes key OL‐related aspects supporting CSR development and goes beyond an organization‐centric viewpoint to consider not only learning within the organization, but also from others, and with others. In particular, the authors identify key learning processes and sub‐processes and critical areas that remain understudied. Overall, the authors propose a macro view of the work done to date at the intersection of OL and CSR, and in doing so help make the ‘OL for CSR development’ scholarship more recognizable as a sub‐discipline.

In response to the global challenge of climate change, companies increasingly disclose sustainability-related information in form of sustainability reports. These reports, however, vary significantly due to multiple institutional and stakeholder pressures. From an academic perspective, institutional theory links these different outcomes to the influences of competing institutional logics on the field-level, representing institutional complexity on the field-level which is characterised by multiple demands from different stakeholders. Although current literature acknowledges that stakeholder may affect institutional logics, it is limited to categorise stakeholder influences on the firm-level, lacking conceptual clarity. Based on institutional and stakeholder constructs, this paper demonstrates that institutional and stakeholder theory provide, on different levels, a theoretical foundation to examine the influences on sustainability reporting. Various constructs of stakeholder theory and institutional fields as well as their limitations and further classification concepts are identified and discussed. This paper thereby advances the understanding between field-level pressures and firm-level agency and demonstrate that both theories can complement each other when examining the influences on sustainability reporting.

In industrialized countries, mobility represents one of the most important sources of CO2 emissions. Most research on promoting sustainable, climate-friendly modes of transportation has focused on urban areas. Rural areas-although characterized by high dependency on individual car ownership and usage-have received less attention. This article explores the potential role of rural employers in supporting sustainable alternatives to commuting by (single-occupied) motorized vehicles among their employees. We conduct a collective case study that considers five employers located in Eastern Austria (Burgenland), drawing from multiple data sources including structured surveys, expert interviews, focus groups, and site visits. Our analysis shows that employers have little incentive to implement measures that foster sustainable mobility among their employees. On the one hand, the costs accruing to employers for implementing such measures tend to exceed the corresponding benefits by a significant margin (unlike in urban areas where significant cost reductions can arise for employers). On the other hand, also employees generally exhibit little demand for such measures. We conclude that both from a societal and a business perspective, it is not efficient to promote sustainable mobility in rural areas via employers.

In recent years, sentiments have been shifting towards nationalist attitudes and increasing anti-foreigner sentiments. Such sentiments can spill over to MNCs given MNCs’ embeddedness in their home-...

Using a consistent dataset for eighteen EU countries, six economic sectors, and six pollution indicators, we analyze decoupling of production–based emissions from GDP growth from 1995 to 2008. Computing decoupling factors as defined by the OECD (2002), we find that in almost all sectors and by almost all pollutants the median EU country had at least some decoupling. However, considerable heterogeneity in its magnitude can be observed across countries, sectors, and pollutants. For most pollutants and sectors, median decoupling performance improved from 2001–2008 compared to 1995–2001, while between–country disparities increased simultaneously. In a second step, we investigate country–level changes in decoupling states between the two sub–periods based on Tapio (2005). We find high diversity across countries and over time. To explain these differences across countries and sectors, we assess the impact of environmental policy stringency, and find tentative evidence that stricter policy encourages decoupling, however the effects are small and imprecise, differ by economic sector and pollutant, and take several years to materialize.

The discourse about commodification of time indicates that under the current socio-economic regime important values get systematically ignored. This paper reviews literature about the value of time in classical political economy, neoclassical economics, the household production approach, household economics, and activity models. Starting with neoclassical economics, all these approaches are largely in accordance with utilitarian methodology. Utilitarian methodology turns out to be incapable of explaining the value of time. The debate about “quality work” allows us to identify the following intrinsic values: power, playfulness, a sense of meaning, and a sense of belonging. These intrinsic values match with the “five sources of motivation” in contemporary psychological research, which confirms the empirical relevance and irreducibility of these values for understanding behavior. We propose a definition of commodification of time and illustrate some of the potential effects of commodification of time.