Societal Goals Research Articles

Types of CSR Initiatives and Fans’ Social Outcomes: The Case of Professional Sport Organizations

Abstract: While the burgeoning research on corporate social responsibility (CSR) indicates the importance of tracking the interest of external stakeholders to obtain societal goals, insight into what types of CSR activities contribute to social outcomes remain scarce. As such, the purpose of this study was to identify the relevant dimensions of CSR that can enhance the social outcomes of one specific group of external stakeholders (i.e., sport fans). Data were collected from US sports fans ( n = 312) over the course of two weeks. The present research indicates that fans gain more excitement and happiness as well as increased their social cohesion if sport organization CSR initiatives are concentrating on sport governance, environmental management and sustainability, and philanthropy issues. Assessing the impact of CSR from micro-level approach would be one way to strengthen the relationship between existing fans and sport organizations to make positive social impact.

Framework to Facilitate Electricity and Flexibility Trading within, to, and from Local Markets

Peer-to-peer (P2P) electricity sharing or trading can empower consumers and prosumers, incentivize the balancing of generation and demand locally, increase system resilience and reliability, and help in achieving societal goals, such as increasing renewable energy penetration. Nevertheless, the development of P2P trading in actual environments has been slow due to the unclear position of P2P markets in the power system. Recent developments in the European legislation are promising for the establishment of P2P markets and energy communities. Hence, the interplay between local trading and existing market structures needs to be addressed carefully. Furthermore, P2P trading with distributed resources presumes that electricity end users will become active players in the power system. This paper proposes a bidding and pricing mechanism for local markets, considering the external markets; a new approach to balance settlement and balance responsibility when local trading occurs; and an interface to promote end-user interest in, and interactions with, local energy trading. The proposed local market concept and interface solution promote the coupling between local and existing retail, wholesale and ancillary service markets, and can be seen as a step towards the establishment of local energy markets in real-life settings.

Human embryo research, stem cell-derived embryo models and invitro gametogenesis: Considerations leading to the revised ISSCR guidelines.

SummaryThe ISSCR Guidelines for Stem Cell Research and Clinical Translation were last revised in 2016. Since then, rapid progress has been made in research areas related to in vitro culture of human embryos, creation of stem cell-based embryo models, and in vitro gametogenesis. Therefore, a working group of international experts was convened to review the oversight process and provide an update to the guidelines. This report captures the discussion and summarizes the major recommendations made by this working group, with a specific emphasis on updating the categories of review and engagement with the specialized scientific and ethical oversight process.

European competitiveness and sustainable development – A policy-oriented response to “Rethinking the role of the EU in enhancing European competitiveness”

Purpose The world order is changing, with the lead of the US waning, along with its reduced commitment to rule-based multilateralism during the past administration. China is on the way to becoming number one again, investing abroad with primarily egoistic motives and steered by an authoritarian domestic regime. Meanwhile, the EU is striving for a new geopolitical role, while becoming more heterogenous. Design/methodology/approach The paper measures performance and competitiveness not only according to conventional criteria but also based on broader welfare indicators. The ultimate aim of competitiveness is to deliver well-being. Decentralized local strategies are presented, but also the need for guidance by societal goals. Findings What we measure matters. The EU is underperforming in per capita GDP and failing to close the gap in labour productivity towards the frontier defined by the USA. But it is leading in environmental and social indicators, has an accessible health system and provides increasing longevity. This performance nevertheless has to be improved, if climate goals should be fulfilled and upcoming new inequalities addressed. Originality/value Localization and place-based strategies have advantages, but also harper the danger that negative spillovers may not be minimized and positive not used. Innovation is a search process but has to be directed by goals in Europe and globally. Otherwise, change incurs high costs and many losers, fostering nationalism and populistic calls to return to a past glory that never existed.

Knowing like a global expert organization: Comparative insights from the IPCC and IPBES

In this paper we draw on Science and Technology (STS) approaches to develop a comparative analytical account of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Intergovernmental science-policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). The establishment of both of these organizations, in 1988 and 2012 respectively, represented important ‘constitutional moments’ in the global arrangement of scientific assessment and its relationship to environmental policymaking. Global environmental assessments all share some similarities, operating at the articulation between science and policy and pursuing explicit societal goals. Although the IPCC and IPBES have different objectives, they are both intergovernmental processes geared towards the provision of knowledge to inform political debates about, respectively, climate change and biodiversity loss. In spite of these similarities, we show that there are significant differences in their knowledge practices and these differences have implications for environmental governance. We do this by comparing the IPCC and IPBES across three dimensions: conceptual frameworks, scenarios and consensus .We argue that, broadly speaking, the IPCC has produced a ‘view from nowhere’, through a reliance on mathematical modelling to produce a consensual picture of global climate change, which is then ‘downscaled’ to considerations of local impacts and responses. By contrast IPBES, through its contrasting conceptual frameworks and practices of argumentation, appears to seek a ‘view from everywhere’, inclusive of epistemic plurality, and through which a global picture emerges through an aggregation of more placed-based knowledges. We conclude that, despite these aspirations, both organizations in fact offer ‘views from somewhere’: situated sets of knowledge marked by politico-epistemic struggles and shaped by the interests, priorities and voices of certain powerful actors. Characterizing this ‘somewhere’ might be aided by the concept of institutional epistemology, a term we propose to capture how particular knowledge practices become stabilized within international expert organizations. We suggest that such a concept, by drawing attention to the institutions’ knowledge practices, helps reveal their world-making effects and, by doing so, enables more reflexive governance of both expert organizations and of global environmental change in general.

Reversing the restrictive trend in diffuse large B‐cell lymphoma trial eligibility: it’s time to open the gates!

Reversing the restrictive trend in diffuse large B‐cell lymphoma trial eligibility: it’s time to open the gates!

Multiple‐Benefit Conservation defined

AbstractA new term, Multiple‐Benefit Conservation, has emerged in the conservation community, but has not been defined. We define Multiple‐Benefit Conservation asconservation efforts designed to simultaneously benefit local communities of people, enhance ecological function, and improve habitat quality for fish and wildlife. Its key features are setting ecological and societal goals at the outset and defining success as achieving these goals simultaneously. This is in contrast to efforts aimed at one goal thatmayalso produce co‐benefits; it is inclusive of ecosystem services but not limited by a focus solely on human benefit. Strengths of this approach include that it is constructive, inclusive of multiple worldviews, easily communicated, solutions‐oriented, and compelling. Multiple‐Benefit Conservation as we define and describe it here appears to provide a pathway useful for designing conservation efforts that are more likely to be inclusive, that will quantify trade‐offs among goals, and can embrace pluralistic conservation leadership.

Opportunities for household energy on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in line with United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals

Approximately seven million population in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau of China, a global climate sensitive region, still rely primarily on yak dung for household cooking and heating. The treatment and combustion of yak dung result in a variety of negative impacts in terms of local alpine grassland degradation, indoor air pollution, public health risk, as well as global climate change. There is an urgent need to explore alternative pathway for affordable and clean energy as indicated in the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals for 2030. This perspective has analyzed the key challenges rooted in yak dung use on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau region. Based on this, this perspective has further proposed a new complementary energy system to take advantage of locally available, clean and sustainable energy sources of wind and solar power, and have provided economic analyses. Meanwhile, this perspective has pointed out the potential barriers to promoting the new complementary energy system in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau region due to traditional habits, economic factors and policies. Finally, strategies for transitioning from yak dung to the proposed alternative energy system is discussed at the end. Successful energy transition for the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau region offers an important option to achieving many other sustainable development goals related to climate change, economic development, and environment. The perspective is expected to shed light on the development of sustainable energy in other developing region or countries in the world to address multiple societal goals.

Inclusionary Housing: An Evaluation of a New Public Rental Housing Governance Instrument in China

Inclusionary housing (IH) is a regulatory instrument adopted by local governments in many countries to produce affordable housing by capturing resources created through the marketplace. In order to assess whether it is efficient, scholarly attention has been widely focused on its evaluation. However, there is a lack of studies evaluating IH from a governance perspective. Since IH is about involving private actors in affordable housing production, the governance point of view of cooperating governmental and non-governmental actors governing society to achieve societal goals is highly relevant. The two most important elements of governance—actors and interrelationships among these actors—are taken to build an analytical framework to explore and evaluate the governance of IH. Based on a research approach that combines a literature review and a case study of China, this paper concludes that the ineffective governance of Chinese IH is based on three challenges: (1) The distribution of costs and benefits across actors is unequal since private developers bear the cost, but do not enjoy the increments of land value; (2) there is no sufficient compensation for developers to offset the cost; and (3) there is no room for negotiations for flexibility in a declining market. Given that IH is favored in many Chinese cities, this paper offers the policy implications: local governments should bear more costs of IH, rethink their relations with developers, provide flexible compliance options for developers, and perform differently in a flourishing housing market and a declining housing market.

New Report on Deep Decarbonization: Implications for US Energy Systems

A recently released report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) has found that deep decarbonization of the US energy system, leading to net‐zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, is feasible and within the historic range of energy system spending as a percent of gross domestic product. A key aspect of the work of the NASEM Committee on Accelerating Decarbonization in the United States: Technological, Policy, and Societal Dimensions was to extend its advice beyond technical and economic decarbonization implications, into the policy and societal considerations required for an effective and just transition to a sustainable energy system. The committee's study produced a technology blueprint for the first 10 years of a transition to deep decarbonization, from 2021–2030, which is aligned with several independent analyses addressing the same problem. The committee presented societal goals that are worthy for achieving a decarbonization transition and a recommended policy framework for achieving technical and societal goals. This article summarizes the important conclusions for readers of this journal.

The new inclusive role of university technology transfer: Setting an agenda for further research

Universities are coming under increasing pressure to produce impact that contributes to socio-economic development. Previous studies have focused on university technology transfer (UTT) mechanisms that lead to the commercialisation of intellectual property. We find that off-late, the legitimacy of such mechanisms, owing to high-failure rates of IP-based start-ups, has come into question. Universities are being invited to widen their academic entrepreneurship (AE) practices to include other forms of knowledge transfer. The increased attention on contemporary concepts such as social entrepreneurship calls for broadening UTT performance indicators to include multiple bottom-lines. These bottom-lines should amplify the societal benefits of AE. This new emphasis raises high-level questions about the societal role of universities and UTT. The aim in this paper is to, therefore, reframe the debate on UTT processes by highlighting a revised agenda for further research. This is done by analysing the extant literature on UTT, academic entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial universities and innovation. The analysis includes a critical review of 96 peer-reviewed articles. As a result, a macro perspective is presented which highlights UTT as-a-mechanism for universities’ contribution to collective societal goals. Propositions are outlined for future research; these can be used for developing new understanding on how universities can actively contribute to socio-economic development agendas.

New Perspective on Investment Models

What is the secret ingredient to securing better long-term investment outcomes? Investors seldom consider institutional investors from an organizational and strategic perspective. Thinking in terms of investment models highlights a severely under-researched area. The authors propose that this different lens is required to make sense of the dynamics in the investment industry and has a lot to offer to boards that are open to this. Five models dominate the investment industry, and the authors identify an emergent one that has its roots in the existing models but takes a strong societal perspective, which they denote the <i>prudent society</i> investment model. Thinking in terms of investment models, boards and decision makers will be able, far better than today, to determine why, how, and what is needed for investment success. <b>TOPICS:</b>Pension funds, portfolio theory, financial crises and financial market history <b>Key Findings</b> ▪ Every investor works with an investment model: a unique combination of goals, risk appetite, investment beliefs, and governance of investment implementation. ▪ Making the underlying assumptions and consequences explicit is key; otherwise, achieving long-term success is a struggle. ▪ Investment models evolve slowly. The increased focus on long-term, private assets and the incorporation of societal goals are new elements but do not (yet) form an entirely new model. Thus, we have to keep learning from and adapting the existing ones.

Building with Nature as integrated design of infrastructures

Many people associate Building with Nature with its flagship project, the Sand Motor. This mega-nourishment redefined the role of natural processes in civil engineering projects, demonstrating that instead of ‘do no harm’ as the highest possible supporting goal of coastal infrastructure, the design could incorporate natural processes to attain societal and ecological goals. As such, the Sand Motor represents a key example of the integrated design of civil infrastructures. In this contribution, we pursue an improved understanding of the integrated design of civil infrastructures, by comparing the illustrative example of the Sand Motor against a framework based on transport infrastructures and the occasional flood defence. It turns out that application of a framework from one domain to another - a conscious act of interdisciplinary learning - results in a modification of that framework. Although the domain of Building with Nature fits well with many existing attributes of integrated design for civil infrastructures (the life cycle approach, adaptive design and adding functionalities), its key attribute (dynamics) adds a unique box to the integrality index. This intellectual effort raises two issues. It demonstrates that our understanding of integrated design is rather specific for different infrastructure-domains. Second, it is likely that the bandwidth of uncertainty that is key to the incorporation of natural processes in infrastructure design, and the changing behaviour of the structure itself in the maintenance phase, has implications for the governance regime of such infrastructures.

Building with Nature perspectives

This publication offers an overview of the latest cross-disciplinary developments in the field of Building with Nature (BwN) for the protection of coastal regions. The key philosophy of BwN is the employment of natural processes to serve societal goals, such as flood safety. The starting point is a systems-based approach, making interventions that employ the shaping forces of the natural system to perform measures by self-regulation. Initial pilots of this innovative approach originate from coastal engineering, with the Sand Motor along the coast of South Holland as one of the prime examples. From here, the BwN approach has evolved into a new generation of nature-based hydraulic solutions, such as mangrove forests, coastal reefs, and green dikes.

The conceptualization of societal impacts of landfill mining – A system dynamics approach

Landfill mining (LFM) refers to the excavation and processing of formerly buried waste streams. It offers significant environmental and societal benefits through the mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions or the reduction of long-term waste management costs. LFM’s profitability, however, is still in question and public investment support might be necessary to fully exploit its potential. To enable decision-makers to identify the best solutions for a landfill site, societal impacts of LFM still have to be investigated. Throughout relevant literature, societal impacts of LFM projects have only selectively been studied and it remains unclear if and which benefits justify policy interventions. This paper firstly provides a comprehensive conceptualization of the societal impact of an LFM project and dives into the underlying societal context of this emerging industry. It disentangles formerly identified burdens and benefits by applying a system dynamics approach to LFM research. Based on this approach, four causal loop diagrams are presented showing how LFM is embedded into its societal context, analyzing the composition of the net societal impact of an LFM project, the mechanisms influencing LFM’s public acceptance, and the dynamics of the market acceptance of LFM products. Key variables and leverage points have been identified, such as (i) technology choices influencing avoided impacts from the mitigations of primary resource consumption, since many societal impacts are closely related to environmental impacts, (ii) a timely and broad stakeholder involvement to prevent project opposition, and (iii) the after-use of the mined landfill, generating a major part of the local and regional societal benefits but also creating potential conflicts between stakeholder interests. Key intradimensional trade-offs and potential conflicts were identified in (i) spatial and (ii) temporal risk distribution, (iii) conflicting societal goals of the after-use such as job creations and recreation, as well as (iv) material and energy recuperation. These findings provide important insights for LFM decision-makers and can help to implement this emerging industry in a sustainable way.

Learning from intersectoral action beyond health: a meta-narrative review.

Intersectoral action (ISA) is considered pivotal for achieving health and societal goals but remains difficult to achieve as it requires complex efforts, resources and coordinated responses from multiple sectors and organizations. While ISA in health is often desired, its potential can be better informed by the advanced theory-building and empirical application in real-world contexts from political science, public administration and environmental sciences. Considering the importance and the associated challenges in achieving ISA, we have conducted a meta-narrative review, in the research domains of political science, public administration, environmental and health. The review aims to identify theory, theoretical concepts and empirical applications of ISA in these identified research traditions and draw learning for health. Using the multidisciplinary database of SCOPUS from 1996 to 2017, 5535 records were identified, 155 full-text articles were reviewed and 57 papers met our final inclusion criteria. In our findings, we trace the theoretical roots of ISA across all research domains, describing the main focus and motivation to pursue collaborative work. The literature synthesis is organized around the following: implementation instruments, formal mechanisms and informal networks, enabling institutional environments involving the interplay of hardware (i.e. resources, management systems, structures) and software (more specifically the realms of ideas, values, power); and the important role of leaders who can work across boundaries in promoting ISA, political mobilization and the essential role of hybrid accountability mechanisms. Overall, our review reaffirms affirms that ISA has both technical and political dimensions. In addition to technical concerns for strengthening capacities and providing support instruments and mechanisms, future research must carefully consider power and inter-organizational dynamics in order to develop a more fulsome understanding and improve the implementation of intersectoral initiatives, as well as to ensure their sustainability. This also shows the need for continued attention to emergent knowledge bases across different research domains including health.

Do drivers of nature visitation vary spatially? The importance of context for understanding visitation of nature areas in Europe and North America

Nature visitation is important, both culturally and economically. Given the contribution of nature recreation to multiple societal goals, comprehending determinants of nature visitation is essential to understand the drivers associated with the popularity of nature areas, for example, to inform land-use planning or site management strategies to maximise benefits. Understanding the factors related to nature, tourism and recreation can support the management of nature areas and thereby, also conservation efforts and biodiversity protection. This study applied a Multiscale Geographically Weighted Regression (MGWR) to quantify the spatially varying influence of different factors associated with nature visitation in Europe and North America.Results indicated that some explanatory variables were stationary for all sites (age 15 to 65, population density (within 25 km), GDP, area, built-up areas, plateaus, and mountains). In contrast, others exhibited significant spatial non-stationarity (locally variable): needle-leaf trees (conifers), trails, travel time, roads, and Red List birds and amphibians. Needle-leaf trees and travel time were found to be negatively significant in Europe. Roads were found to have a significant positive effect in North America. Trails and Red List bird species were found to have a positive effect in both North America and North Europe, with a greater effect in Europe. Red List amphibians was the only spatially variable predictor to have both a positive and negative impact, with selected sites in North America and northern Europe being positive, whereas Iceland and central and southern Europe were negative. The scale of the response-predictor relationship (bandwidth) of these locally variable predictors was smallest for Red List amphibians at 1033 km, with all other spatially variable predictors between 9558 and 12,285 km.The study demonstrates the contribution that MGWR, a spatially explicit model, can make to support a deeper understanding of processes associated with nature visitation in different geographic contexts.

Public service media in the age of SVoDs: A comparative study of PSM strategic responses in Flanders, Italy and the UK

Netflix and other transnational online video streaming services are disrupting long-established arrangements in national television systems around the world. In this paper we analyse how public service media (PSM) organisations (key purveyors of societal goals in broadcasting) are responding to the fast-growing popularity of these new services. Drawing on Philip Napoli’s framework for analysing strategic responses by established media to threats of competitive displacement by new media, we find that the three PSM organisations in our study exhibit commonalities. Their responses have tended to follow a particular evolution starting with different levels of complacency and resistance before settling into more coherent strategies revolving around efforts to differentiate PSM offerings, while also diversifying into activities, primarily across new platforms, that mimic SVoD approaches and probe production collaborations. Beyond these similarities, however, we also find that a range of contextual factors (including path-dependency, the role and status of PSM in each country, the degree of additional government support, cultural factors and market size) help explain nuances in strategic responses between our three cases.

Students’ understanding of psychological literacy in the UK undergraduate curriculum

Psychological literacy is a concept in psychology learning and teaching in Higher Education (HE) that considers how psychology students can intentionally apply psychological knowledge to personal, professional and societal goals. However, despite its prevalence among psychology Higher Education scholars and developers, it is unclear whether psychology students are aware of psychological literacy. In this mixed methods study, psychology undergraduates studying in the UK (N=117) were asked to rate the core eight competencies of psychological literacy, as outlined by the QAA (2019) subject benchmark statement. Overall, we found that students were mostly unaware of the term ‘psychological literacy’. However, students did value the attributes that it includes. When asked to define the term, students typically referred to the capacity to understand subject–specific knowledge, with some students discussing the application of this knowledge to everyday life too. Implications for the development of psychological literacy as an emergent pedagogic practice are discussed.

Driving innovation in biotechnology with Private-Public Partnerships: A Singapore perspective

Public and private sector institutions share different goals and perspectives, but they can form a formidable innovation drive when they join forces. Private-Public Partnerships (PPPs), common in biomedical and pharmaceutical research, are entities where interactions and integrated innovation can take place to serve business and societal goals. In this perspective, we examine how PPPs function in the life sciences sector, and how they differ from other models of private-public cooperation. We examine two successful examples of PPPs in the Singaporean biomedical field. Finally, we look into the role PPPs can have in the development of future biotechnology applications, as one of the ways small(er) countries can develop significant bioengineering competencies and translate scientific research into real-life applications.