Challenges in Building Robust Interventions in Contexts of Poverty:Insights from an NGO-driven multi-stakeholder network in Ethiopia

We examine the demise of a multi-stakeholder network that was launched to promote an inclusive dairy market in Ethiopia to better understand why nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) may develop interventions in contexts of poverty that fail to endure after they exit. We identify organizational reflexivity – the capacity to recognize and understand the recursive interplay between an intervention and the local environment – as a key explanatory mechanism for this intervention outcome. Limited reflexivity not only prevented the NGO we studied from properly aligning the intervention with the context (design failures), but also prevented the organization from adjusting its intervention when negative feedback emerged (orchestration failures), which eventually evolved into the demise of the network (maintenance failure). While our study confirms the theoretical premise that NGOs need to contextualize their interventions, we expand current knowledge by highlighting the role of organizational reflexivity in this process. Moreover, by showing how reflexivity deficits can trigger a cascade of failure, especially when intervening in voids where incumbent firms have interests in maintaining the void, our study calls attention to the politicized nature of institutional voids

Institutions, Partnerships and Institutional Change

One of the goals of the Partnership Resource Centre (PRC) is to execute evidence-based research and further develop a theoretical framework on the linkages between partnerships and value chain development (ECSAD 2009). Within the PRC Trajectory on Global Value Chains, this goal was specifi ed into the explicit objective to improve public knowledge of how partnerships shape or organise the process of inclusion of smallholders and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in (global) value chains, resulting in more local sustainable competitiveness. The global value chains trajectory takes as point of departure the multi tude of institutional constraints that prevent primary producers and SMEs from exploiting local and foreign market opportunities. Apart from adverse climate conditions, limitations in infrastructure, and health and education issues, market-oriented activities are hampered by the lack of an appropriate institutional business environment. Especially the rural poor often have no proper access to, for instance, credit, technology, or land titles, while their market prospects are insecure (Markelova et al 2009; Poulton et al 2006). Value chain partnerships are increasingly considered to be useful vehicles to tackle these limitations, evidenced in the active promotion of particularly bi-partite partnerships between companies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). The synergy derived from partnership cooperation can overcome failures resulting from unilateral action by actors confined within one of the societal sectors (Kolk et al 2008). By addressing the institutional business environment, partnerships can play a pivotal role in enhancing the chances for primary producers and SMEs to turn themselves into viable suppliers of local or global value chains (Bitzer et al 2011) in support of sustainable, local economic development

The interplay of agency, culture and networks in field evolution

We examine organizational field change instigated by activists. Contrary to existing views emphasizing incumbent resistance, we suggest that collaboration between incumbents and challenger movements may emerge when a movement's cultural and relational fabric becomes moderately structured, creating threats and market opportunities but remaining permeable to external influence. We also elucidate how lead incumbents' attempts at movement cooptation may be deflected through distributed brokerage. The resulting confluence of cultural and relational "structuration" between movement and field accelerates the pace but dilutes the radicalness of institutional innovation, ensuring ongoing, incremental field change. Overall, this article contributes to the emergent literature on field dynamics by uncovering the evolution and outcomes of collaborative work at the intersection of social movements and incumbent fields

EVALUACIÓN DE IMPACTO AMBIENTAL EN COSTA RICA: EL CASO DE PROYECTO DE CAMPO DE GOLF

EVALUACIÓN DE IMPACTO AMBIENTAL EN COSTA RICA:  EL CASO DE PROYECTO DE CAMPO DE GOL

Moving circular fashion from niche to mainstream: A case study of a multi-stakeholder collaboration to transform the textile industry in The Netherlands

We examine how a multi-stakeholder collaboration (MSC) in the emergent issue field of circular textiles in The Netherlands gains legitimacy as field coordinator. Drawing on our preliminary findings from rich, qualitative data, we present a process model that highlights three objects of legitimacy – the organizational entity, the activities, and the role itself – that need to be obtained by the MSC in order to successfully claim and enact the role of field coordinator. We highlight the interplay between these three objects of legitimacy, and show how field coordinator legitimacy is a dynamic process that is both institutionally bound and agentic. As such, our study contributes to the vibrant literature on how MSCs address complex societal problems, while also reflecting the increased scholarly interest in how moral markets emerge and become structured in response to the detrimental effects of conventional business practices

CIE Conference 2022 Videos

Videos of the opening and keynote presentation, the panel discussion and the CIE aftermovie

Governing Collaborative Value Creation in the Context of Grand Challenges: A Case Study of a Cross-Sectoral Collaboration in the Textile Industry

The aim of this study is to understand how governance mechanisms in cross-sector collaborations (CSCs) for sustainability affect value creation and capture and subsequently the survival of this organizational form. Drawing on a longitudinal, participatory, single-case study of collaborative action in the textile industry, we identify three governance mechanisms—safeguarding, bundling and connecting—that coevolve with the rising and waning of collaborative tensions and the shifting levels of action in the CSC we studied. These mechanisms aided value creation and helped facilitate private value capture. We integrate these insights into a process model that visualizes the interplay between governance mechanisms of tensions and systems of value creation and capture in CSCs for sustainability. Our study contributes to the cross-sector collaboration literature by providing a dynamic and nuanced understanding of how governance mechanisms influence outcomes in CSCs for sustainability. We also add to the business model for sustainability literature by theorizing the value creation and capture system of collaborative rather than individual organizations. Our findings have important implications for policymakers who fund collaborative organizations and practitioners who manage or participate in them

Shifting cognitive frames through collective action to address grand challenges: A case study of a multi-stakeholder initiative in the apparel industry

Inter-organizational arrangements that aim to address social and environmental “grand challenges” often take the form of multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSIs) (also cross-sector partnerships or collaborations). Grand challenges -- problems characterized by knowledge uncertainty, dynamic complexity and value conflict -- require diverse organizations to join forces to resolve them. MSIs are complex and dynamic arrangements due to the constant change occurring in the external environment and in the dynamics of the collaboration, as each participating organization may have very different frames of reference and interests that impede action and continuity. Scholars have long recognized the tensions of conflicting logics that are inherent in MSIs and the challenges that MSIs face in reconciling incongruent organizational identities, goals or shared visions. Accordingly, MSIs need facilitators (i.e., ‘orchestrators’) to navigate the persistent and pervasive challenges of both reconciling conflicting logics and using complementary logics in such a way that the collaboration achieves collective goals. Our study examines how MSI orchestrators work to meet this challenge by shaping and shifting cognitive frames in the context of a mature organizational field. We investigate the mechanisms used to enable cognitive shifts in logic and highlight the role of orchestration in enacting frame shifts. Empirically, we examine an MSI in the apparel industry that aims to guide retailers and fashion brands in the implementation of recommerce and rental business models, thereby pushing the textile and apparel industry from linear to regenerative and circular use of textile resources. We identify several frames from the perspective of diverse stakeholders and uncover the four mechanisms that orchestrators use to influence frame shifts. We also see from our findings that orchestrators efforts to influence and navigate frame shifting is both emergent and planned as they attempt to navigate and manage the tensions and complexity that arise in multi-stakeholder initiatives focused on sustainability challenges

Shifting cognitive frames through collective action to address grand challenges: A case study of a multi-stakeholder initiative in the apparel industry

Inter-organizational arrangements that aim to address social and environmental “grand challenges” often take the form of multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSIs) (also cross-sector partnerships or collaborations). Grand challenges -- problems characterized by knowledge uncertainty, dynamic complexity and value conflict -- require diverse organizations to join forces to resolve them. MSIs are complex and dynamic arrangements due to the constant change occurring in the external environment and in the dynamics of the collaboration, as each participating organization may have very different frames of reference and interests that impede action and continuity. Scholars have long recognized the tensions of conflicting logics that are inherent in MSIs and the challenges that MSIs face in reconciling incongruent organizational identities, goals or shared visions. Accordingly, MSIs need facilitators (i.e., ‘orchestrators’) to navigate the persistent and pervasive challenges of both reconciling conflicting logics and using complementary logics in such a way that the collaboration achieves collective goals. Our study examines how MSI orchestrators work to meet this challenge by shaping and shifting cognitive frames in the context of a mature organizational field. We investigate the mechanisms used to enable cognitive shifts in logic and highlight the role of orchestration in enacting frame shifts. Empirically, we examine an MSI in the apparel industry that aims to guide retailers and fashion brands in the implementation of recommerce and rental business models, thereby pushing the textile and apparel industry from linear to regenerative and circular use of textile resources. We identify several frames from the perspective of diverse stakeholders and uncover the four mechanisms that orchestrators use to influence frame shifts. We also see from our findings that orchestrators efforts to influence and navigate frame shifting is both emergent and planned as they attempt to navigate and manage the tensions and complexity that arise in multi-stakeholder initiatives focused on sustainability challenges

Appropriating Relational Value from Collaborative Networks for Sustainability

Our study elucidates relational value creation and appropriation in collaborative networks for sustainability (CNfS), which focus on grand societal challenges and include a multiplicity and diversity of actors. Using a relational view lens, we conducted a longitudinal, multiple case, field study of collaborative networks for sustainability in the circular textile and fashion industry, unpacking the interplay between value creation from relational interdependence, relational-specific assets and material output and the multilevel appropriation of that value. Our findings show that value appropriation is contingent on the perception of use value and cascades through individual, organizational and network levels. The ability of actors to capture cascading value on different levels has a direct influence on sustaining the continuity of value creation and to achieving the shared societal goals of CNfS. We developed a model of value appropriation in CNfS to illustrate the cascading flow of value at micro (individual), meso (organizational) and macro (network) levels. Our study makes novel contributions to the literatures on strategic alliances, cross-sector partnerships, and open innovation networks