The assignment aims at providing an opportunity to pick up and investigate a
topic that has been raised and/or discussed during the course. Choose something
that interests you, and where you would like to know more and get a chance to
challenge and elaborate your own thinking! You may find inspiration from the
extended literature list, from discussions in seminars and lectures, as well as
from current debates in media and elsewhere. Once you have chosen your topic
or issue, your specific task is to:
a) develop a research question that helps you to investigate some particular
aspect of the specific phenomena/issue of interest,
b) do a literature review within the particular research field that helps you to
frame and position your work theoretically and give you ”tools” to analyse your
empirical findings.
c) design and conduct a “doable” ( i.e. limited) empirical study that answers to
your research question, and
d) write a report in the form of a complete scholarly paper that conforms to the
following standards:
1. Addresses a research problem that is interesting and relevant from a
theoretical and practical viewp01oint.
2. Contains a well-formulated and convincing argumentation that leads to the
problem.
3. Presents a clear aim that is related to the problem statement.
4. Contains a review that covers relevant scientific research and a clear
”conclusion” of the literature review (e.g. a summary, model, framework of
hypothesis).
5. Contains an empirical study, including independent and relevant data
collection.
6. Contains a reflective and convincing analysis of the empirical material that is
clearly related to the theoretical framework.
7. Draws relevant and credible conclusions on the basis of the findings.
8. Shows the correct use of references and list these in accordance with the
”Harvard system”.
9. Is logically structured and written in ”proper” English.
One important thing to note:
While you are free to choose your topic of interest, you need to be able to relate
this to the course literature. This means that you don’t need to take the “direct”
perspective of the given literature, but you need to engage with the course
literature in some way.
However, you also need to move beyond the course literature, to find relevant
and interesting research articles and books that directly speak to your interests
and chosen research question. You thus need to independently search for
literature and previous studies on your topic, and to search for data (primary
and/or secondary) for your empirical study. The paper should conform to the
standard requirements of academic writing, including correct references to the
literature and to other sources of information, a clear structure, and a coherent
argument, and – not least! – make a contribution to knowledge.
The final individual course paper should cover approx. 8-9 pages (excluding the
cover page, the reference list and attachments such as questionnaires), 1.5
spaced, Times New Roman, 12 points.

Course Readings

Lecture 1: Governance, Organisation and Standards – An Introduction

Ahrne, G. and N. Brunsson (2005), ”Organizations and meta-organizations”, Scandinavian Journal of Management 21, pp. 429-449.
Ahrne, G. and N. Brunsson (2011), ”Organization outside organizations: the significance of partial organization”, Organization 18(1), pp. 83-104.
Brunsson, N., Rasche, A., and D. Seidl (2012), ”The Dynamics of Standardization: Three perspectives on Standards in Organization Studies”, Organization Studies 33(5-6), pp. 613-632.
Djelic, M-L and K. Sahlin-Andersson (2006), ”Introduction: A World of Governance: Therise of transnational regulation”, in M. L. Djelic and K. Sahlin-Andersson (eds.),
Transnational Governance. Institutional Dynamics of Regulation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 1-28.
Sahlin-Andersson, K. (2006), Corporate Social Responsibility: a trend and a movement but of what and for what? Corporate Governance vol. 6, pp. 595-608.

.
Lecture 2: Measuring sustainability

Graeber, D., (2012). ”Dead zones of the imagination. On violence, bureaucracy, and
interpretive labor”. Hau: Journal of Etnographic Theory 2(2), pp. 105-128.
Power, M., 2004, “Counting, control and calculation: Reflections on measuring and
management”. Human Relations, vol. 57, no. 6, 765-783.
Schwartz, J., Beloff, B., and Beaver, E., (2002). ”Use Sustainability Metrics to Guide
Decision-Making”. (Downloadable by http://people.clarkson.edu/~wwilcox/Design/sustain.pdf).

Lecture 3: Medialization and sustainability

Hjarvard, S. (2008). The Mediatization of Society: A Theory of the Media as Agents of Social and Cultural Change. Nordicom Review, 29(2), 105-134.
Pallas, J., Fredriksson, M., and Wedlin, L., “Translating institutional logics: when the media logic meets professions”, work in progress.
Schultz, F., Suddaby, R., and Cornelissen JP. (2014). The role of business media in
constructing rational myths of organizations. In J. Pallas, S. Jonsson & L. Strannegård (Eds.),
Organizations and the Media: Organizing in a Mediatized World (pp. 13-32). London:
Routledge.

Lecture 4: Social Movements and Sustainability

Ahrne, G., & Brunsson, N., (2011), ”Organization outside organizations: The significance of partial organization”. Organization, 18(1), pp. 83–104.
Benford, Robert D., and David A. Snow. “Framing processes and social movements: An overview and assessment”. Annual review of sociology (2000): 611-639.
Power, Michael. “The audit society—Second thoughts”. International Journal of Auditing 4.1 (2000), pp. 111-119.
Wijkström, F. 2004. Changing focus or changing role? The Swedish nonprofit sector in the new millennium, Strategy Mix for Nonprofit Organisations, pp. 15-40: Springer.

Lecture 5: Public procurement as a political tool for sustainability

Amann, M., Roerich, J. K., Eβig, M. And C. Harland (2014), ”Driving sustainable supply
chain management in the public sector. The importance of public procurement in the
European Union”, Supply Chain Management. An International Journal. 19/3, pp. 351-366.

Lecture 7: Concluding Lecture

Previous readings for the GOS-course.
Grolin, J., (1998), ”Corporate Legitimacy in Risk Society: the case of Brent Spar”, Business
Strategy and the Environment 7, pp. 213-222.