Call for Papers

Contemporary socio-ecological challenges can be seen as a crisis of collective creativity, where humanity is struggling to (re-)imagine multiple, diverse, just, and inclusive futures (Gümüsay & Reinecke, 2022). More specifically, we need to update our ways of researching and organizing to the Anthropocene, the ‘era of the humans’, as it is an unprecedented geological period for which human actions have irreversible consequences on the Earth ecosystem which can no longer be left unnoticed (De Cock et al., 2021; Steffen et al., 2015). Indeed, old theories and methods will not suffice anymore: organization scholars must create and offer something new. Indeed, this is an era where complex socio-ecological problems, such as species extinction, acidification of oceans, massive air and water pollution, and the regular irruption of dramatic disasters will have long-standing consequences for both human and non-human actors (Whiteman et al., 2013), and where human and non-human agencies are deeply intertwined in entanglements that define collective sensemaking, decision making, and ultimately organizing (Heikkurinen et al., 2021; Pascucci et al., 2021).
 
While the complexity of the Anthropocene has started to be recognized (Heikkurinen et al., 2021), we feel there is still lack of collective engagement about how we develop new forms of scholarship in this dramatic era. In our view complex and multiple socio-ecological crises can only be resolved if we, management and organization scholars, forge creative spaces to define sustainable (and desirable) futures (Gümüsay & Reinecke, 2022). In these spaces, we should experiment and develop novel academic practices, to understand how disciplines can be combined to contribute to enhance planetary health (Baudoin et al., 2022). In order words, we need a scholarship able to navigate imaginaries and desirable futures, to understand and investigate, with discipline and creativity, what stands at the crossroad of organizational and natural sciences. However, this scholarship is still nascent, and struggles to be seen and recognized (Leahey et al., 2017; Baudoin et al., 2022).
 
On one hand, we still lack focus and momentum about how to ‘bring sciences in the boardroom’ and help organizations to better understand the socio-ecological foundations and impacts of their actions and strategies, at individual, organization, and system level (Whiteman et al., 2013). On the other hand, management and organizational theories and practices thus far have largely overlooked the relevance of combining different sciences to investigate social-ecological relations and responsibilities of businesses to operate in planetary systems while keeping their impact within planetary boundaries (Whiteman et al., 2013; Pinkse & Gasbarro, 2019).
 
Given this background, we believe that using science for a collective understanding of the socio-ecological foundations of our society, and its contradictions, is key to engage and promote creative scholarship and actions able to address the current crises. Moreover, it stimulates to (re-)think our relation to nature and therefore it involves (re-)considering the intricate entanglement of the social and ecological dimensions of the Anthropocene (Nilsen, 2023). In our view, investigating sustainable organizing requires researchers to navigate the complexity and contradictions of socio-ecological dynamics more thoroughly (Ergene et al., 2021), in order to investigate and develop creative solutions that are also science-based able to effectively address they current crises. It also requires collective mobilization to develop novel, rigorous and ambitious interdisciplinary research, also to overcome the “fractured epistemology” of management and organization sciences (Gladwin et al., 1995; Wohlgezogen et al., 2020) and adopt a more systemic perspective (Williams et al., 2017).
 
With this purpose in mind, we aim to bring together organization and management scholars working with biophysical and ecological data in a safe space where we can discuss how to use theoretical angles established in different fields of knowledge, to promote effective and creative collaborations across disciplines, as well as sharing of best practices. We aim at co-creating a space of shared learning, and to help such scholars to get together and form a stronger, diverse, and more recognizable stream of research (Baudoin et al., 2022).
 
We welcome submissions, both theoretical and empirical, that directly engage with novel, innovative, and creative strategies to combine insights from social and natural sciences, developing new methods using biophysical and ecological variables, concepts, or frameworks, and redefined level and scale of engagements with social actors, organizations, and non-human agencies. We particularly encourage submissions from authors using approaches and methodologies that are less common in management or organization studies, but used in other disciplinary fields, including arts and creative projects. In this sub-theme, we will also exchange experience and insights on methodological and theoretical struggles in this interdisciplinary endeavour and summarize what we learn from this work of bringing together different sciences to re-imagine sustainable futures collectively.
 
Submissions might explore, for instance, the following questions:

• How can we combine different scientific knowledge domains to tackle the socio-ecological problems of the Anthropocene?

• How can different forms of engaged scholarship be developed to navigate the complexity of socio-ecological crises?

• What have we learned so far from research bridging insights and methods from natural and social sciences? What is still missing?

• How do different perspectives interpret and respond to observed and/or experienced changes in socio-ecological systems?

• What are the methods available – and the potential struggles – to integrate socio-ecological contexts in organization and management studies?

• How can the combination of organization and natural sciences lead to the development of creative solutions for the current socioenvironmental crises?

References

• Baudoin, L., Carmine, S., Nava, L., Poggioli, N., & van den Broek, O.M. (2022): “Imagining a Place for Sustainability Management: An Early Career Call for Action.” Journal of Management Studies, 60 (3), 754–760.

• De Cock, C., Nyberg, D., & Wright, C. (2021): “Disrupting climate change futures: Conceptual tools for lost histories.” Organization, 28 (3), 468–482.
• Ergene, S., Banerjee, S.B., & Hoffman, A.J. (2021): “(Un)Sustainability and Organization Studies : Towards a Radical Engagement.” Organization Studies, 42 (8), 1319–1335.
• Gladwin, T.N., Kennelly, J.J., & Krause, T.S. (1995): “Shifting paradigms for sustainable development: Implications for management theory and research.” Academy of Management Review, 20 (4), 874–907.
• Gümüsay, A.A., & Reinecke, J. (2022): “Researching for desirable futures: From real utopias to imagining alternatives.” Journal of Management Studies, 59 (1), 236–242.
• Heikkurinen, P., Clegg, S., Pinnington, A.H., Nicolopoulou, K., & Alcaraz, J.M. (2021): “Managing the Anthropocene: Relational agency and power to respect planetary boundaries.” Organization & Environment, 34 (2), 267–286.
• Leahey, E., Beckman, C.M., & Stanko, T.L. (2017): “Prominent But Less Productive: The Impact of Interdisciplinarity on Scientists’ Research.” Administrative Science Quarterly, 62 (1), 105–139.
• Nilsen, H.R. (2023): “Code Red for Humanity : The Role of Business Ethics as We Transgress Planetary Thresholds.” Journal of Business Ethics, 189, 1–7.
• Pascucci, S., Dentoni, D., Clements, J., Poldner, K., & Gartner, W.B. (2021): “Forging Forms of Authority through the Sociomateriality of Food in Partial Organizations.” Organization Studies, 42 (2), 301–326.
• Pinkse, J., & Gasbarro, F. (2019): “Managing Physical Impacts of Climate Change : An Attentional Perspective on Corporate Adaptation.” Business & Society, 58 (2), 333–368.
• Steffen, W., Richardson, K., Rockström, J., Cornell, S.E., Fetzer, I., Bennett, E. M., ... & Sörlin, S. (2015): “Planetary boundaries: Guiding human development on a changing planet.” Science, 347 (6223); https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1259855.
• Whiteman, G., Walker, B., & Perego, P. (2013): “Planetary Boundaries : Ecological Foundations for Corporate Sustainability.” Journal of Management Studies, 50 (2), 307–336.
• Williams, A., Kennedy, S., Philipp, F., & Whiteman, G. (2017): “Systems thinking : A review of sustainability management research.” Journal of Cleaner Production, 148, 866–881.
• Winn, M.I., & Pogutz, S. (2013): “Business, Ecosystems, and Biodiversity : New Horizons for Management Research.” Organization & Environment, 26 (2), 203–229.
• Wittneben, B.B.F., Okereke, C., Banerjee, S.B., & Levy, D.L. (2012): “Climate Change and the Emergence of New Organizational Landscapes.” Organization Studies, 33 (11), 1431–1450.
• Wohlgezogen, F., McCabe, A., Osegowitsch, T., & Mol, J. (2020): “The wicked problem of climate change and interdisciplinary research : Tracking management scholarship’s contribution.” Journal of Management & Organization, 26 (6), 1048–1072.
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