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Socio-economic disparities lead to inequalities of access to health, education, water and sanitation, and pass on to the next generation. Ethical issues of intragenerational and intergenerational justice are therefore stronger than ever and seem inextricably linked to the nature of our social and economic systems. Tackling such grand challenges and their underlying interdependencies from a management and organisation studies perspective requires a concerted action of multiple stakeholders at different levels, including the private sector. It also requires rethinking current organisational models to leave space to new forms of organising. A socio-ecological, complexity-oriented perspective is increasingly necessary to appreciate the influence of factors at individual, community, organisational and policy levels, embedded in the natural environment. A wide range of literatures have, largely independently, discussed various ways organisations work towards a more sustainable world. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.

This chapter focuses on a more structural governance perspective as it has evolved in the public management literature in the last three decades and applies that to sustainable development. Organizational networks for sustainability come in many shapes and forms and with many different labels. The rationale for organizational networks to exist can be seen from a system and from an actor perspective. As in the general literature on organizational networks, we can identify different types of networks in the literature with regard to sustainability issues as well. Engineered networks are consciously created and governed and people operating in these networks might over time develop a shared consciousness and identity. In general, there is no reason to believe that networks in the area of sustainability function differently than in other areas and therefore the insights from the general literature on networks and partnerships are in principle applicable.

This chapter explores how learning occurs in hybrid organisations, such as social enterprises with dual financial and social goals. Knowing how to learn and adapt to problems arising from these contradictory goals can be informed by theoretical insight provided by contemporary organisational learning theories. Learning on the organisational level differs from individual learning and is not simply the aggregation of the latter. Hybrid organisations’ adaptive challenges can be categorised as stemming from the logic tensions present in hybrids. Hybrid organisations are required to identify and adapt to the various types of tensions that their organisations face. Organising tensions refer to competing designs, structures and processes oriented towards the achievement of a desired outcome. Belonging tensions relate to identity, and are formed by competing values, logics, and roles. Finally, performing tensions relate to the divergence in notions of organisational success, as defined and guided by strategies to attain goals prescribed by different logics and stakeholders.

Fix Forward (FF) is a social enterprise based in Cape Town, South Africa. The organisation’s by line – 'building experts' – speaks to both the mission of the organisation and the focus of their work. Financial independence is important for hybrid organisations – supporting the creation of social value. Yet, hybrid organisations are required to work conscientiously towards this goal, often initially reliant on donors and grants, seeking to reduce this as the organisation mature. The institutional context may vary, with considerable latitude in how ‘self-sustaining’ and 'market-generated revenues' are defined and understood. Looking at FF through the lens of theory about hybrid organising helps us to see the ways in which the tensions in hybrid organisations can be managed, as well as highlighting some of the challenges involved in delivering on the goals of a dual mission, and financial sustainability.

This chapter provides an overview of how corporations and other market organizations integrate responsible innovation (RI) into their organizing models, employing a perspective that focuses on governance structures and organizational practices as manifestations of RI on the organizational level. Organization scholars have begun to consider how organizations and corporations in particular – as sites where many innovations are developed and scaled – can facilitate responsible innovation. Moving beyond a focus on external governance structures, organizational research on RI can help further the conversation about the role of market organizations in embedding the principles of RI in innovation processes. The chapter considers two illustrative governance structures – legal forms and participatory structures – and discusses how they can enable responsible innovation in organizations. It also discusses two such sets of practices – social accounting and procedures to conceptualize problems.

This chapter introduces readers to the idea of impact investing and how its definition has evolved in the literature. It also introduces the organizational actors involved and the instruments they use. Asset owners, such as retail investors, private foundations or sovereign wealth funds, hold the capital and decide about its allocation along the impact capital chain, thus deciding the impact orientation of the capital. All the actors belong to an ecosystem, where each member plays a critical role in trying to mitigate the risk of impact investments and expand the pipeline of investable opportunities. The analysis of the business model is, thus, a driving factor in understanding the organizational actors targeted by impact investing capital providers and in differentiating them in respect to those targeted by other types of social finance. The chapter concludes with a discussion of delivering on the promise of impact investing.

On the organizational level, separate fields of public management and public policy, management and organization studies, as well as fragmented theoretical discussions within them, tend to operate as though the organizations under their respective microscopes operate in a vacuum and focus on best practices firmly rooted in one area. Organizational approaches will continue to evolve, in relation to the macro and micro forces that influence them, and which they influence. The image of organizations in relation to macro and micro levels implicitly highlights interconnectedness between many academic disciplines and their traditional levels of analysis and sectoral purviews. Overall, changes to the macro level could instigate a much faster shift toward a sustainability transition, and toward addressing grand challenges. Consumers and employees reaching the workforce today were born into a normative environment primarily in favor of sustainability and painfully aware of the challenges societies face.