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PDW-04 [SWG-10]: Between Local and Global: Examining Tensions between Local Stakeholder Perspectives to Global Challenges

Convenors:
Salla Laasonen
Rotterdam School of Management, The Netherlands
Rieneke Slager
Nottingham University, UK
Rashedur Chowdhury
Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School, University College Dublin, Ireland, & Darden Graduate School of Business, University of Virginia, USA

Call for Applications

Facilitators/Guests:

  • Frank de Bakker, VU University Amsterdam, The Netherlands
  • Bobby Banerjee, Cass Business School, City University London, UK
  • Thomas Donaldson, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, USA
  • Israel Drori, School of Business, College of Management Academic Studies, Israel
  • Martha Feldman, University of California, USA
  • M. May Seitanidi, Kent Business School, UK

Purpose

One of the challenges academic research faces is dealing with dichotomies such as private-public, local-global, profit-non-profit, general-specific, and abstract-concrete. This challenge is especially relevant for the current challenges of the global economy, in which the shifts of public-private governance structures entail new challenges to democracy, private regulation and standardization, and political role of business.

At the local level, tragedies such as the Rana Plaza disaster revealed in an appalling manner the exploitative elements of the global economy and global supply chains. Similarly, albeit more within the public realm, the Greek financial crisis has had detrimental consequences at the local level. What do these transnational phenomena look like from the perspective of local stakeholders? What implications, role, and relevance does local voice have in the global setting?

In this pre-Colloquium Development Workshop (PDW), we tackle the tension and divide between the local and global, by engaging with local stakeholders. In this workshop, our invited guests include individuals who bring their local insight to the phenomena of poverty, corporate responsibility, and global supply chains. We also explore the ways in which art and artefacts can be used reflexively in examining the local-global divide.

We invite scholars interested in these topics within the business and society context to join us in this interactive workshop. In this pre-colloquium workshop, the questions that we seek to discuss and answer include the following:

  • What are new and innovative analytic approaches to studying the local and global tensions within corporate responsibility, governance, and other business and society related contexts?
  • What do we actually mean by ‘local’, and how can or does the local mobilize within different governance structures?
  • What does accountability mean at the local and global levels, and in different cross-sector contexts?
  • What role do cross-sector partnerships and various forms of transnational governance play in this equation?


The expected outcomes of this PDW include new theoretical and empirical insights to the workshop theme. This PDW will be based on interactive discussion groups and stimuli delivered by the invited participants, which consist of local stakeholder guests and invited senior scholars. Special emphasis will be given to the invited guests who will spur the discussion by sharing their personal experiences. The role of the senior scholars will be to participate in the discussions and offer their views, and steer the theoretical and/or empirical implications of the discussion. We seek for a group of about 35 participants.

 

 

Application

All scholars interested in participating in this debate are invited to apply. However, preference will be given to early career scholars such as assistant professors, post-docs, and PhD students who are interested in the broader field of business & society, civil society, social movements, corporate social responsibility or related topics.

Please submit a single document of application (.doc, .docx or .pdf file) that includes:

  • On the first page: a short letter of application containing full details of name, address (postal address, phone and email), and affiliation
  • CV including list of publications and/or work in progress
  • Short and possibly provocative essay (1–2 pages text or a few PowerPoint slides) in which you address one of the above mentioned questions


Criteria for selection are:

  • Originality of ideas in essay
  • Existing and potential future impact in the field of business and society
  • Research focus and geographical location (taken into account the geographical location of the facilitators/guests)

 

Salla Laasonen is Assistant Professor at Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University, The Netherlands. Prior to joining RSM, she has been a visiting scholar at Stanford University, George Washington University, USA, and a post-doctoral researcher at Turku School of Economics at the University of Turku, Finland, where she continues to teach corporate responsibility related topics. She defended her doctoral dissertation in 2012 in the field of international business. Her main research interests are cross-sector interaction, corporate responsibility, stakeholder engagement, and stakeholder dialogue. Salla's research has appeared in journals such as 'Business & Society', 'Journal of Business Ethics' and 'Corporate Governance'.
Rieneke Slager is Assistant Professor in Strategy and Sustainability at Nottingham University Business School (NUBS), UK. Her PhD entitled "SRI Indices and responsible corporate behaviour: A study of the FTSE4Good Index" was conducted at the International Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility at NUBS. Her current research examines the link between CSR and responsible investment markets, the influence of CSR metrics on organizational behavior, and institutional work in the context of CSR, including bribery and corruption. Her work appears or is forthcoming in journals such as 'Business & Society', 'Organization Studies', and 'Policy & Politics'.
Rashedur Chowdhury is a Lecturer in Management at the Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School, University College Dublin, Ireland, and a Batten Fellow at Darden Graduate School of Business, University of Virginia (UVA), USA. Rashedur's earned his PhD at the University of Cambridge, and his thesis "Reconceptualizing the Dynamics of the Relationship between Marginalized Stakeholders and Multinational Firms," received The Society for Business Ethics Best Dissertation Award in 2014. He has been invited as a Visiting Scholar by INSEAD Business School, France; Darden, UVA; Faculty of Business and Economics, HEC Lausanne, Switzerland; School of Business and Economics, University of Jyväskylä, Finland; The Center for the Study of Democracy, School of Social Sciences, University of California, Irvine; and Hass School of Business, University of California, Berkeley. His most recent project examines the Rana Plaza collapse in Bangladesh.