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The purpose of this empirical study is to apply the industrial marketing and purchasing approach to explore ethical value co-creation and business ethics in the circular economy (CE) ecosystem (CEE) of the Finnish textile industry. A CEE involves a variety of business and institutional actors with shared business or societal targets. Ethical principles may become embedded in their first social interaction and can play an important supportive role in economic, environmental and social value co-creation, especially when the actors have sustainability goals.

This study uses a qualitative single-case study of a CEE in the Finnish textile industry where diverse actors seek to create value from circularity. The analysed data represent a set of interviews with business and institutional actors directly involved in managerial activities in the CEE of textile industry in Finland.

This study provides a conceptual framework of actors’ interactions and ethical value co-creation aimed at meeting CE and sustainability goals at the levels of actors, the network and the ecosystem. The findings emphasise the value of proactive collaboration among business and institutional actors seeking innovations, knowledge-sharing and business development in fostering more circular operations in the textile industry and thereby effecting the CE transition. Efficient interactions for value co-creation among actors can be grounded on ethical values such as trust, transparency, shared sustainability goals and the power to positively influence and motivate actors and even consumers to transition to CE principles.

An original research framework of ethical value co-creation is proposed in this study based on the combined concept of ethical embeddedness and ecosystem orchestration mechanisms to achieve sustainability and CE goals. This study contributes to the limited business ethics studies in circular business and CEE research and empirically examines business interactions among actors within a CE ecosystem. The managerial and policymaking implications of this study highlight the strategic importance of various actors’ interactions in implementing circularity in business processes.

This study aims to explore the range of sustainability-related discourses by the stakeholders within a particular Finnish Higher Education Institution (HEI); interaction between the discourses and the context of the HEI; and the extent to which different understandings of sustainability cause challenges for the implementation of the university strategy for sustainability. Specifically, the paper explores how the employees within the HEI make sense of sustainability in their teaching, research and daily life and the extent to which sustainability-related discourses are aligned with the university strategy.

This research draws upon collected qualitative and quantitative data. It focuses on individual discourses by executives, teaching and research staff within an HEI regarding their understandings of sustainability and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

This paper illustrates the key challenges of sustainability and SDG implementation that may emerge in HEIs due to varied understandings. The results indicate a need for efficient HEI strategic vision communication and consideration of the stakeholders’ multiplicity of sustainability values.

This paper sheds light on the challenges involved in seeking to enhance sustainable development in an academic setting with multiple disciplines and categories of staff guided by academic freedom. The analysis thus advances the understanding of academic sustainability-related discourses and framings as well as mechanisms through which the implementation of sustainability-related efforts can be enhanced in such a context.

The transition to a circular economy (CE) is a known concern in the context of the textile industry, in which business actors attempt to facilitate circular activities such as textile recycling. However, a lack of established business relationships and networks creates uncertainty for textile circulation. In such business environments, managerial decisions regarding CE may depend not only on normative behaviour but also on heuristics that guide their choices. Since business relationships for textile circularity require interactions between business actors, this study explores how managerial heuristics are shaped in the CE transition within the textile industry and their impact on actors’ interactions within business relationships and networks.

Empirically, this qualitative study is based on interviews with managers representing companies and organisations engaged in business relationships and networks aimed at a CE transition in the textile industry, as well as on publicly available secondary data.

The findings indicate that managerial decisions promoting circularity can be influenced by, besides normative information assessment, factors predominant in (1) the business and regulatory environment, (2) managers’ experience and knowledge obtained during interactions within business networks and (3) the internal strategic approaches of business organisations. This study identifies adaptation, experience, interaction and strategy heuristics that may be utilised by managers in making decisions in the context of uncertainty, such as the industrial transition to a CE.

This study expands the knowledge of heuristics applied to managerial decision making in interacting business firms and institutional organisations aiming to facilitate textile recycling and proposes a heuristics toolbox. The study provides an insight into business actors’ interactions, as well as various factors inside and outside the organisations shaping the managerial decisions. By doing this, the study adds to the literature, highlighting the importance of contextualisation and the interrelation between the individual and business environment levels in business-to-business management.

This paper aims to explore methods of teaching sustainability and business ethics, relevant to the modern demand for student’s skills and knowledge. The study explores the challenges of teaching a business school undergraduate-level course and argues that a constructivist pedagogy is a suitable epistemological approach for designing a course unit concerning sustainability and ethics.

The paper presents case study findings drawn upon course feedback and course reflections aimed at making sense of what the most effective pedagogic approaches were that influenced students’ learning.

Results indicate that students appreciate active forms of learning via practical assignments and discussions. As knowledge of sustainability and business ethics is important for the student’s future career path, students need to develop skills of applying conceptual knowledge to practice via constructive pedagogical methods.

This empirical study contributes to the literature of constructivist pedagogics, which is explored in the context of sustainable development and business ethics teaching. Practically, it contributes to the analysis of teaching methods and frameworks applied in the course emphasizing the necessity of engaging in interactive and personalized learning and teaching processes.

Issues of teaching ethics and sustainable development are known concerns, but they have to be addressed systematically because of the changing business environment. This study explores the constructivist pedagogy based on empirical evidence and highlights its value in the educational process.

This study aims to explore how Russian-origin immigrant entrepreneurs manage to adapt their business-to-business (B2B) relationship management practices and moral concerns to the business ethics of their country of origin and of the host country via the prism of ethical relativism. By focusing on the ethical values of immigrant entrepreneurs in a business relationship context, the study aims to extend the currently limited understanding of these issues in the B2B marketing field.

A qualitative approach is applied to provide findings from eight in-depth interviews with first-generation Russian entrepreneurs living and doing business in Finland. A narrative approach to the data analysis is used, in particular by applying a thematic analysis of the collected interviews because of the focus on the personal experiences of the interviewees.

The results illustrate how the immigrant entrepreneurs adapt to ethical values and norms in Russia and Finland and how they enact those values in B2B relationship management in the countries. Immigrant entrepreneurs share several national and ethical backgrounds, which may influence their interaction in international markets, helping them adapt to country-specific business ethics.

The results imply that managers should acquire knowledge on ethical norms at the global level and at the national level, where they aim to expand their business. Productive business relationships involve the premises of honesty, transparency, fairness toward business partners and minimizing opportunism. However, business relations between developed and emerging markets may demand relativism when addressing ethical behavior.

This is one of the few studies that explore the ethical values of immigrant entrepreneurs in the context of international business relationships. The study contributes to the limited literature on ethics in the fields of B2B marketing and immigrant entrepreneurship. The authors encourage further research on ethical values adoption by immigrant entrepreneurs, which is an essential topic in times of increased workforce immigration.

This study aims to explore the challenges and complexities of interaction in international stakeholder networks within the context of projects focused on the implementation of sustainable development goals (SDGs). In particular, it examines the challenges faced by stakeholders in a network from a developed country during interaction in the context of a developing country.

Using a qualitative approach, this study analyses interview data collected from the key managers of an international consulting company in charge of a water supply and sanitation project in Nepal. The primary data is triangulated with secondary data, such as project reports and related academic articles.

This study illustrates how interaction in international stakeholder networks affects and is interrelated with SDGs, as well as how aiming to achieve one specific goal can stimulate the implementation of other sustainable goals. Further, this research shows how project managers from a developed country had to adapt to the specifics of the developing country context and how their sustainability project influenced the well-being of local communities by improving environmental and social sustainability.

The research suggests that challenges in stakeholder interaction may arise because of differences in process management methods used by the international stakeholders involved in the project and country-context specifics, such as corruption, imperfect national regulations, cultural specifics, effects of climate change, etc.

The paper contributes to the literature on international multi-stakeholder interaction between actors from developed and developing countries. Furthermore, it adds to the literature on stakeholder networking by highlighting the importance of engaging in a dialogue with local communities during the conceptualisation stages of both sustainability and SDG implementation because of diverging worldviews and practices.

The purpose of this study is to explore stakeholder responses to an airline’s sustainability signaling act. Responding stakeholders, their interpretations and feedback to the signal are studied in light of signaling theory and corporate social responsibility (CSR).

This study was conducted using the social media analytics approach. A total of 7,002 publications in the public domain were collected from the internet’s news services, blogs and major social media websites. These posts were subjected to content, sentiment and reach analyses.

Diverse stakeholder groups, ranging from industry professionals to societal influencers, responded via social media to a CSR-related press release, the main types being general influencers of society and those working in the aviation or tourism industry. The themes of responses ranged from sustainability, technical development and the future of transport to green transition policies. Hence, the press release as a signal was linked to other discussions prevalent in society. Sentiments of the publications were mainly neutral or positive, with very few negative responses from stakeholders. Many responses were supportive, and the critical responses did not contain accusations of greenwashing.

Environmental CSR communications are strategically important to companies operating in carbon-intensive industries. The public may view breakthroughs in technology as an efficient way of emissions reductions cascaded with improvements in processes and practices. Utilizing new technology also affects several stakeholders and creates new opportunities for them. Knowledge on the subject may influence the tone of discussion.

This study views a press release as sustainability-related signaling and examines stakeholder responses in social media, contributing to CSR and signaling research in the context of the airline industry by observing the signaling process over time along with the behavior of the actors involved.