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The prevailing need for a more sustainable management of natural resources depends not only on the decisions made by governments and the will of the population, but also on the knowledge of the role of energy in our society and the relevance of preserving natural resources. In this sense, critical work is being done to instill key concepts—such as the circular economy and sustainable energy—in higher education institutions. In this way, it is expected that future professionals and managers will be aware of the importance of energy optimization, and will learn a series of computational methods that can support the decision-making process. In the context of higher education, this paper reviews the main trends and challenges related to the concepts of circular economy and sustainable energy. Besides, we analyze the role of simulation and serious games as a learning tool for the aforementioned concepts. Finally, the paper provides insights and discusses open research opportunities regarding the use of these computational tools to incorporate circular economy concepts in higher education degrees. Our findings show that, while efforts are being made to include these concepts in current programs, there is still much work to be done, especially from the point of view of university management. In addition, the analysis of the teaching methodologies analyzed shows that, although their implementation has been successful in favoring the active learning of students, their use (especially that of serious games) is not yet widespread.

AbstractSociety requires companies to adopt ethical and responsible behavior with regard to environmental policies in order to achieve sustainable development. One of the most controversial sectors in terms of sustainable production is the fashion industry. This study analyzes the extent to which seven of the biggest fashion brands in Spain and around the world communicate their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) policies (specifically, those related to sustainability). To this end, we identify the social media platforms used the most by the target audiences for these brands, and apply an exploratory, descriptive methodology to a content analysis of communication about their CSR policies, both formal (corporate websites) and informal (social media). The objective is to identify whether these companies communicate their sustainable activities and practices in the context of their CSR. Our findings confirm that the brands analyzed have integrated sustainability and environmental protection initiatives into their CSR policies. However, although they do communicate this on their corporate websites, they rarely do so on social media. We thus conclude that the seven fashion brands analyzed could make better use of social media to raise awareness and educate customers about environmental sustainability.

The subject of research in the paper is the capital structure of companies in the Republic of Serbia. The research sample consists of companies that operated in the manufacturing industry in the Republic of Serbia in the period 2006–2020. The aim of the research is to identify firm-specific variables that have significant influence on the capital structure of the analyzed companies. Using a panel data methodology, three leverage models were estimated: long-term leverage, short-term leverage, and total leverage. The research results confirm the importance of company size, profitability, tangibility, and risk in determining the capital structure of companies in the Republic of Serbia. However, the research results show that size, profitability, and tangibility of assets have the opposite effect on long-term leverage compared to short-term and total leverage. That is, the behavior of companies in the Republic of Serbia in the case of long-term leverage is in accordance with the predictions of the trade-off theory, while in the case of short-term and total leverage, the behavior of companies can be explained by the pecking order theory.

Management science focuses on organisational culture. This reflection also applies to the broadly understood cultural context, as organisations operate in specific places and at specific times. As entrepreneurs enter foreign markets, there is a need to deepen their knowledge of cultural aspects, which results in the possibility to generate practical guidelines for shaping organisational culture in a different cultural environment. The article assumes that out of four elements conditioning organisational culture—type of environment, type of organisation, features of organisation and features of participants—two of them, type of environment and features of its participants, are the basic ways to organisational culture, by means of which the organisational culture is permeated by artefacts, values and basic assumptions, characteristic of national cultures. This permeation is exemplified by organisations from the same industry, having the same top management but functioning in different cultural environments. The study was conducted with the use of the multiple, exploratory and explanatory case study method. It consisted of three stages: The first stage included literature analyses (analyses of secondary data and legacy data), which aimed to determine the features of two cultures—Polish and Ukrainian. At the second stage, the authors conducted pilot studies among the representatives of the Polish and Ukrainian national culture. At the third stage, the organisational cultures of companies operating in the environment of the Polish and Ukrainian culture were surveyed. The research sample included 590 people. The authors based their studies on the Milton Rokeach Values Scale and an author’s tool, in which Hofstede’s concept of cultural dimensions. The statistical analysis involved the nonparametric Mann–Whitney U test.

The European Universities initiative, launched by the European Commission in 2018, has its origin in the concept of Civic Universities (CivUs) and consists of transnational higher education alliances throughout the European Union that share long-term strategies. They are expected to become universities of the future, to promote European ideals and character, and to revolutionize the competitiveness and excellence of European higher education. European universities add 41 alliances, involving 31 different countries. This article presents an early quantitative evaluation of this initiative. This paper addresses the coverage of the 41 alliances and selects five of the most advanced for a deeper evaluation of their best practices and their contribution to the realization of CivUs. This paper also outlines the criteria for evaluating the extent to which good practices implemented by these alliances are aligned and can contribute to the attributes of CivUs, based upon state-of-the-art educational standards. A quantitative framework, based on application of the analytical hierarchy process (AHP), is also provided to rank the good practices developed by these alliances against the previous evaluation criteria. Furthermore, by applying a sensitivity analysis, this paper also addresses the robustness of this approach.

AbstractSlowing climate change will almost certainly require a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, but agreement on who should reduce emissions by how much is difficult, in part because of the self-serving bias—the tendency to believe that what is beneficial to oneself is also fair. Conducting surveys among college students in the United States and China, we show that each of these groups displays a nationalistic self-serving bias in judgments of a fair distribution of economic burdens resulting from mitigation. Yet, we also show, by disguising the problem and the identity of the parties, that it is possible to elicit perceptions of fairness that are not influenced by national interests. Our research reveals that the self-serving bias plays a major role in the difficulty of obtaining agreement on how to implement emissions reductions. That is, the disagreement over what constitutes fair climate policy does not appear to be due to cross-national differences in what constitutes a fair distribution of burdens. Interventions to mitigate the self-serving bias may facilitate agreement.

One of the repeating themes around the provision of the knowledge and skills needed for delivering sustainable communities is the idea of a “common language” for all built environment professionals. This suggestion has been repeated regularly with each new political and professional review within and between different sectors responsible for the delivery of sustainable communities. There have been multiple efforts to address academic limitations, industry fragmentation and promote more interdisciplinary working and sector collaboration. This research explored the role of skills for sustainable communities, particularly within the higher education (HE) sector, and the responses to support the development of a “common language of sustainability” that can be shared between different sectors, professional disciplines and stakeholders. As an interdisciplinary group of academics and practitioners working with the HE sector in the North East of England, we evaluate the progression of sector collaboration to develop a quintuple helix model for HE. We use this as a suitable framework for systematically “mapping” out the mixed sector (academic, public, business, community and environmental organisations) inputs and influences into a representative sample of HE degree modules that are delivered from foundation and undergraduate to postgraduate levels, including examples of part-time and distance-learning modules. We developed a cascade of models which demonstrate increasing levels of collaboration and their potential positive impact on the effectiveness of education on sustainable communities. The methodological assessments of modules were followed by semi-structured group reflective analysis undertaken through a series of online workshops (recorded during the Covid19 lockdown) to set out a collective understanding of the generic skills needed for the delivery of sustainable communities. These generic skills for sustainable communities are presented as a pedagogical progression model of teaching activities and learning outcomes applied to the levels within HE. We propose sustainability education principles and progressions with the hope that they can have an impact on the design or review of current degree modules and programmes. The paper informs future sustainability research to be grounded in holism and systems thinking; better understanding of values, ethics, influencing and political impact; and procedural authenticity.