Organizing for Sustainable Futures: Micro and Macro-institutional Conditions of Transformation

About

Our society is facing a legitimacy crisis. The accelerating ecological crisis, the growing gap between the rich and the poor as well as the systemic risks provoked by disconnected financial markets make it necessary to profoundly rethink our routines of production and consumption. While there is a growing awareness for the importance and urgency of radical change, deep processes of transformation usually face numerous institutional and psychological barriers that have to be overcome. As Jared Diamond described in his book “Collapse”, civilizations often react to a crisis of which they do not understand the causalities by reinforcing the routines that might have created the crisis in the first place. The VIU Summer School in 2025 will go beyond those routines, to reimagine pathways for the Grand Transition on which we have embarked on a planetary scale, and to reflect upon the radical change, both in what economic actors do, and how organization scholars theorize about it. We look forward to engaging in discussion with the young scholars in the Summer School.

Course leader

Prof. Francesco Zirpoli (Ca’ Foscari University of Venice), Prof. Guido Palazzo (University of Lausanne), Prof. Ruth Sealy (University of Exeter)

Target group

Applications are welcome from current PhD students, post-doc scholars and young researchers in Management, Strategy, Organization Theory, Finance, Economic Sociology, Political Science, Philosophy, Psychology, and related disciplines from universities worldwide. Applications from high level policy makers and officials in public and private institutions will be considered if their background is adequate.

Course aim

The summer school aims at the development of ideas that promote a more sustainable future by bringing together young scholars from all over the world to discuss their ideas on the Grand Transition of our society from the microlevel of individual decision-making to the organizational and the societal level.

This year the summer school has been jointly coorganized with the Horizon Europe-UKRI “Rebalance” project on the relationship between capitalism and democracy (GA 101061342).

The school gives young scholars the opportunity to discuss with eminent scholars in management theory and to test their ideas and present their work. Participants will become familiar with recent research from a broad set of disciplines.

They will work on their ability to engage in the transdisciplinary discourse which is required for the development of innovative answers to grand sustainability challenges.

Thanks to the collaboration with the Rebalance project this year the school has the opportunity to add democracy among the grand challenges, and learn from leading scholars the ways in which business can undermine democratic principles, processes and values, or contribute to them through new business models.

Fee info