Business Strategies for Sustainability

Business Strategies for Sustainability
Author: Helen Borland
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 424
Release: 2018-10-03
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0429858981

Business Strategies for Sustainability brings together important research contributions that demonstrate different approaches to business strategies for sustainability. Many corporate initiatives toward what firms perceive to be sustainability are simply efficiency drives or competitive moves – falling far short of actual strategies for ecological sustainability. To suggest true ecological sustainability strategies, this new research anthology adopts an interdisciplinary, or transdisciplinary, approach to discern what business strategies might look like if they were underpinned by environmental and ecological science. The 23 chapters in this anthology reflect five main topic sections: (a) delineating sustainability challenges and visions; (b) contradiction, integration and transformation of business and sustainability logics; (c) innovating and developing strategic capabilities for sustainability; (d) assessing and valuing sustainability; and (e) toward multi-level engagement and collaboration.

Wicked Environmental Problems

Wicked Environmental Problems
Author: Peter J. Balint
Publisher: Island Press
Total Pages: 267
Release: 2012-06-22
Genre: Science
ISBN: 1610910478

"Wicked" problems are large-scale, long-term policy dilemmas in which multiple and compounding risks and uncertainties combine with sharply divergent public values to generate contentious political stalemates; wicked problems in the environmental arena typically emerge from entrenched conflicts over natural resource management and over the prioritization of economic and conservation goals more generally. This new book examines past experience and future directions in the management of wicked environmental problems and describes new strategies for mitigating the conflicts inherent in these seemingly intractable situations. The book: reviews the history of the concept of wicked problems examines the principles and processes that managers have applied explores the practical limitations of various approaches Most important, the book reviews current thinking on the way forward, focusing on the implementation of "learning networks," in which public managers, technical experts, and public stakeholders collaborate in decision-making processes that are analytic, iterative, and deliberative. Case studies of forest management in the Sierra Nevada, restoration of the Florida Everglades, carbon trading in the European Union, and management of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area in Tanzania are used to explain concepts and demonstrate practical applications. Wicked Environmental Problems offers new approaches for managing environmental conflicts and shows how managers could apply these approaches within common, real-world statutory decision-making frameworks. It is essential reading for anyone concerned with managing environmental problems.

Sustainable Development Teaching

Sustainable Development Teaching
Author: Katrien Van Poeck
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 257
Release: 2019-05-08
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1351124323

The aim of this book is to support and inspire teachers to contribute to much-needed processes of sustainable development and to develop teaching practices and professional identities that allow them to cope with the specificity of sustainability issues and, in particular, with the teaching challenges related to the ethical and political dimension of environmental and sustainability education. Bringing together recent scholarship on the topic, this book translates state-of-the-art academic research into teaching models, methods and tools. Starting with an outline of the challenge of sustainability, it offers insights and models for understanding the interesting yet ambiguous concept of ‘sustainable development’ and the complex process of transforming society in a more sustainable direction (Part I). It then goes on to provide a guide to preparing courses and lessons as well as tools for reflection about teaching practices and the multiplicity of approaches to addressing ethical and political challenges in sustainable development teaching (Part II). Finally, the book offers useful conceptual frameworks, models and typologies about the concrete design and implementation of sustainable development teaching (Part III). This book will be essential reading for students of education, as well as teachers in compulsory and higher education and sustainability education researchers.

PEOPLE, LANDSCAPE, SUSTAINABILITY

PEOPLE, LANDSCAPE, SUSTAINABILITY
Author: Ellen Fetzer
Publisher: Cuvillier Verlag
Total Pages: 210
Release: 2023-06-09
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 373696806X

With this book, we aim to help communities initiate and sustain local systems change. Experiences from a variety of transfer projects between universities and civil society in different countries and cultures are included. The focus is on the development of methodological competencies, which we explain along the Design Thinking process and provide with practical implementation recommendations. This is followed by a case study detailing how business models are developed from tested prototypes for social innovations and social enterprises and how business plans are created. The book is aimed at anyone involved in working in and with communities. This includes students, teachers, and action researchers from academia as well as staff in city governments or NGOs and, of course, members of communities who want to grow into the role of community promoter.

Sustainable World: Approaches to Analyzing and Resolving Wicked Problems

Sustainable World: Approaches to Analyzing and Resolving Wicked Problems
Author: Sonya Remington-Doucette
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2017
Genre: Environmental management
ISBN: 9781524912369

Offers a comprehensive overview of the problem solving methods used by sustainability scientists to resolve real-world sustainability problems. The book's content is based on an undergraduate sustainability course taught by the author in the School of Sustainability at Arizona State University.

The Routledge Handbook of Catalysts for a Sustainable Circular Economy

The Routledge Handbook of Catalysts for a Sustainable Circular Economy
Author: Hanna Lehtimäki
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 846
Release: 2023-11-30
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 1000976734

This groundbreaking handbook leads the way in accelerating the transition to a sustainable circular economy by introducing the concept of a catalyst as a positive and enhancing driving force for sustainability. Catalysts create and maintain favourable conditions for complex systemic sustainability transition changes, and a discussion and understanding of catalysts is required to move from a linear economy to a sustainable and circular economy. With contributions from leading experts from around the globe, this volume presents theoretical insights, contextualised case studies, and participatory methodologies, which identify different catalysts, including technology, innovation, business models, management and organisation, regulation, sustainability policy, product design, and culture. The authors then show how these catalysts accelerate sustainability transitions. As a unique value to the reader, the book brings together public policy and private business perspectives to address the circular economy as a systemic change. Its theoretical and practical perspectives are coupled with real-world case studies from Finland, Italy, China, India, Nigeria, and others to provide tangible insights on catalysing the circular economy across organisational, hierarchical, and disciplinary boundaries. With its broad interdisciplinary and geographically diverse scope, this handbook will be a valuable tool for researchers, academics, and policy-makers in the fields of circular economy, sustainability transitions, environmental studies, business, and the social sciences more broadly.

Climate Change: A Wicked Problem

Climate Change: A Wicked Problem
Author: Frank P. Incropera
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 371
Release: 2016
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1107109078

A pragmatic, no-holds-barred assessment of climate change, for anyone wishing to be fully informed on the topic.

Sustainable Energy Landscapes

Sustainable Energy Landscapes
Author: Sven Stremke
Publisher: CRC Press
Total Pages: 531
Release: 2012-09-12
Genre: Nature
ISBN: 1439894043

In the near future the appearance and spatial organization of urban and rural landscapes will be strongly influenced by the generation of renewable energy. One of the critical tasks will be the re-integration of these sustainable energy landscapes into the existing environment—which people value and want to preserve—in a socially fair, environmentally sound, and economically feasible manner. Accordingly, Sustainable Energy Landscapes: Designing, Planning, and Development focuses on the municipal and regional scale, where energy-conscious interventions are effective, and stakeholders can participate actively in the transition process. This book presents state-of-the-art knowledge in the exciting new field of sustainable energy landscapes. It bridges the gap between theory and fundamental research on the one hand, and practice and education on the other. The chapters—written by experts in their fields—present a selection of interdisciplinary, cutting-edge projects from across the world, illustrating the inspiring challenge of developing sustainable energy landscapes. They include unique case studies from Germany, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, Canada, Denmark, Austria, Italy, and the United States. The editors and team of contributing authors aim to inspire readers, providing a comprehensive overview of sustainable energy landscapes, including principles, concepts, theories, and examples. The book describes various methods, such as energy potential mapping and heat mapping, multicriteria decision analysis, energy landscape visualization, and employing exergy and carbon models. It addresses how to quantify the impact of energy transition both on landscape quality and energy economy, issues of growing importance. The text infuses readers with enthusiasm to promote further research and action toward the important goal of building energy landscapes for a sustainable future.

Leadership for Sustainability

Leadership for Sustainability
Author: R. Bruce Hull
Publisher: Island Press
Total Pages: 274
Release: 2020-11-17
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1642831670

Solving today’s environmental and sustainability challenges requires more than expertise and technology. Effective solutions will require that we engage with other people, wrestle with difficult questions, and learn how to adapt and make confident decisions despite uncertainty. We need new approaches to leadership that empower professionals at all levels to tackle wicked problems and work towards sustainability. Leadership for Sustainability gives readers perspective and skills for promoting creative and collaborative solutions. Blending systems thinking approaches with leadership techniques, it offers dozens of strategies and specific practices that build on the foundation of three main skills: connecting, collaborating, and adapting. Inspiring case studies show how the book’s strategies and principles can be applied to diverse situations: Coordinating the activities of widely dispersed individuals and groups who may not even know they are connected, illustrated by the work of urban planners, local businesses, citizens, and other stakeholders advancing ambitious climate action goals via a Community Energy Plan in Arlington County, Virginia Collaborating with diverse stakeholders to span boundaries despite their differences of opinion, expertise, and culture, as illustrated by the bold actions of a social entrepreneur who transformed the global food service industry with the “plant-forward” movement Adapting to continuous change and confounding uncertainty, as a small nonprofit organization mobilizes partners to tackle poverty, water scarcity, sanitation, and climate change in rural India Readers will come away with a holistic understanding of how to lead from where they are by applying leadership principles and practices to a wide range of wicked situations. While the challenges we face are daunting, the authors argue that these situations present opportunities for creating a more just, healthy, and prosperous world.

Developing a Sustainability Mindset in Management Education

Developing a Sustainability Mindset in Management Education
Author: Kerul Kassel
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 407
Release: 2018-04-17
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1351063324

With an expanding awareness of the challenges of sustainability, featured more in the daily news than in higher education textbooks, scholars and faculty have been called to connect their syllabi to the ‘real world’. This book doesn’t just offer the ‘why’; it offers the ‘how’ through presenting the definition and model of the ‘sustainability mindset’ to help educators frame curricula to facilitate broad and deep systemic learning among current and future leaders. A sustainability mindset is intended to help individuals analyze complex management challenges and generate truly innovative solutions. The sustainability mindset breaks away from traditional management disciplinary silos by integrating management ethics, entrepreneurship, environmental studies, systems thinking, self-awareness and spirituality within the dimensional contexts of thinking (knowledge), being (values) and doing (competency). This book is aimed at professors, faculty members, instructors, teaching assistants, researchers and doctoral students in higher learning management education programs. Chapter contributors are all teaching professionals from programs around the world, who have been doing research and creating curricula, assessments, tools, and more for the students in their classes, and the book will be globally applicable.