Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been traditionally interpreted as the sum of practices, policies, and strategies linked with social and environmental benefits that corporations implement to serve multiple stakeholders’ interests simultaneously. The evolution of meanings and implications of traditional and contemporary interpretations of CSR, focuses on integrated CSR as a breakthrough approach to business, society, and environment. Several theories and trends that integrated CSR is rooted in are: stakeholder theory, ethics, value creation, and the increasing global call for sustainable growth and development, under both financial and ethical perspectives. Selected case studies will serve as empirical evidence of processes, practices, and strategic tools that can allow the integration of CSR into the company core business and will open avenues for further discussions and practical innovative developments in CSR strategy to both academics and practitioners.

This study examines the empowerment of low-power, vulnerable stakeholders of global, complex supply chains as one effective strategy to increase value co-creation and to moderate the vulnerabilities that threaten supply chain resilience. Previous scholars have indicated the necessity of investigating the concept of value co-creation further by including various stakeholder perspectives and suggesting systems of evaluation. This research thus focuses on low-power smallholder farmers within the coffee supply chain by qualitatively evaluating the effectiveness of value co-creation projects. The study also analyzes the extent of development and the nature of empowerment initiatives designed conjointly by nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and coffee roasters that are addressed to farmers. The mixed qualitative methodology includes a literature review, interviews, focus groups, and content analysis of 20 value co-creation projects conducted in various developing and emerging coffee-producing countries. The research proposes a theoretical framework employed to conduct focus groups with Brazilian coffee farmers. This framework empirically demonstrates that these farmers are in the process of becoming business partners of the coffee supply chain thanks to various empowerment initiatives, common to most of the analyzed projects, that appear to moderate specific vulnerabilities of the coffee supply chain and therefore benefit supply chain resilience.

The globalisation phenomenon entangles issues of different kinds affecting attitudes and actions of individuals, corporations, smaller enterprises, communities and governments of both developed and emerging markets. In particular, lower boundaries and higher freedom of sourcing have enabled companies to opt, in many cases, for a wild and often unregulated growth by exploiting resources all over the world. This has become one of the most relevant causes of the proliferation of energy and environmental crises, for instance, and an increased consciousness toward fair treatment of resources and people spread by key local and international stakeholders.

In this paper, we provide early insights about a rethinking of the dominant logic of circular economy (CE) systems, which are described by the literature as still too strongly focused on the circularity of physical resources primarily for economic and environmental benefits. We could observe that the traditional narrative of the CE is being challenged by new strategies that include the relationships among stakeholders and the reallocation of stakeholder roles. This is even more evident in the current health crisis, COVID-19. Circular economy can have higher integrated impacts beyond the mere economic and environmental spheres if it is conceptualized as an open and dynamic loop of relationships, where stakeholders’ power, roles and responsibilities overlap and converge into an emergent joint-value creation process.

This paper focuses on distribution strategies in the luxury brand market and digital channels. With the evolution of new technologies and new devices such as smartphones and tablets, companies that operate in the high-value market started to embrace digital channels as a part of their distribution strategies. However, little research has been done regarding luxury brand companies and the new distribution patterns available online. By analysing the distribution strategies implemented online by well-known luxury brand companies, this paper aims to demonstrate that companies operating in the luxury brand market have overcome their scepticism about the use of digital technologies for selling products via online channels. In fact, thanks to the new digital technologies luxury firms are able to recreate online the same distribution models available offline, thereby responding effectively to new consumption patterns and the needs of luxury brand consumers. JEL codes: M30, M31

4.0 Technology Within Fashion and Luxury Production