Motivation: Reverse Logistics is part of the concept of Sustainable Supply Chain Management, which is the supply chain consideration of the economic, environmental and social goals of all the stakeholders. These considerations should be balanced in a so-called Triple Bottom Line approach. However, literature approaching the social aspects is almost inexistent and the Triple Bottom Line approach is not common when examining the supply chain problems. The study focuses on companies operating in the Swedish market, since the country is an example in many TBL aspects. Moreover, the study is limited to the fashion apparel industry due to its high amount of returns.  Objectives: The purpose of this study is to explain how Reverse Logistics in the fashion industry can contribute to the social dimension of Triple Bottom Line, as well as to identify the tools and strategies used by the fashion companies to balance the trade-offs between the Triple Bottom Line dimensions in the context of Reverse Logistics and explain the reasons behind the decisions.  Approach: This is a multiple case study of six companies. Both primary (semi-structured interviews) and secondary (corporate reports and websites) sources were used to collect data. The empirical data was analyzed using pattern matching, first each case individually and thereafter cross-case analyses were performed.  Conclusions: The social contribution of Reverse Logistics in the fashion industry is mainly limited to donations to charity. In addition, it is not focused on the workforce, as suggested by the literature. Regarding the trade-offs in Triple Bottom Line, most of the fashion firms do not recognize them in the context of Reverse Logistics. Therefore, companies do not need to prioritize the Triple Bottom Line dimensions or use tools to balance them.

<p> Pacific Small Island States (PSIS) are in the precarious position as some of the first jurisdictions to grapple with the current and forecasted effects of climate change, such as forced migrations and loss of culture. Yet, islanders' viewpoints are neither often fully understood nor heeded by those at the international decision making levels. Therefore, how and to what extent are PSIS successfully preparing for climate change? </p><p> This completed study used a mixed methods approach that examines nissology &mdash; how islanders view and understand themselves &mdash; and its relationship with successful (discussed and defined within the study) adaptation planning. The study also used a mixed methods approach to juxtapose the findings of the nissological and success analyses with a second research question: an in-depth study and analysis of regional and global policymaking entities, and the degrees to which they may influence islanders' preparation for climate change. </p><p> The study examined 18 PSIS and their Climate Change Adaptation Plans (CCAPs) and then interviewed PSIS' representatives at their respective Missions to the United Nations in New York City to evaluate how PSIS view and foresee current and future policies regarding climate change at the global, regional, and local levels. Then, fieldwork was performed within the United States Territories in the Pacific: American Samoa, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands to obtain on-the-ground information regarding implementation of plans, policies, and projects. </p><p> The study attempted to address two specific gaps in the literature via the triangulation of methods and data: the relationship between an island-centric viewpoint of CCAPs and successful climate change as well as how policymaking in the Pacific at the local, regional, and global levels either assisted or hindered successful climate change adaptation policy. </p><p> The results suggested answers to these two key questions as well as several unexpected or emergent findings. Regarding the two principal research questions, PSIS that crafted their CCAPs in a more nissological or island-centric manner were indicative of states that were foreseen to be more successful in adapting to current and future climate change effects. Next, PSIS that were part of AOSIS, the various regional associations, and those PSIS that had complete sovereignty (independent) were indicative of those PSIS expressing greater overall success at preparing for climate change than those PSIS not meeting these criteria. However, not all PSIS had the opportunity to become members of AOSIS or certain regional organizations for various reasons. </p><p> Finally, a policy document was created at the end of the study to illustrate some of the best practices based upon this study's findings. Immediately preceding the policy document are other emergent findings indicative of future areas of research and exploration within the realms of nissology, regional associations and partnerships, and successful climate change adaptation.</p>

This study was carried out to examine how innovation can support sustainability and why these two concepts are important for agriculture. To do this, it was necessary to explore the meaning of sustainability and innovation for sustainability, the barriers and opportunities in building a local innovation system by identifying learning interactions, and the role of higher education institutions in achieving sustainability. Since there has been no empirical study of innovation and sustainability in agriculture from a bottom-up perspective, a qualitative case study with multi-methods approach was conducted. The field study took place in Yucatán, México, in the Conkal community over a period of three months in 2013. This research was comprised of in-depth interviews with stakeholders involved in habanero chile farming to identify their perceptions, challenges, and the nature of their willingness and practice of innovation and sustainability. Both Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats (SWOT) and document analysis were used to complement the interview evidence. The results highlight the interpretations of sustainability principles (economic, ecological, and social) and the flow of knowledge and learning interactions that are occurring in the habanero chile product system. To increase innovation capacity, the integration of multiple local players is important to create local innovation systems that can also achieve sustainability principles. The study suggests that learning interactions and knowledge networks at the local level can be used to develop and disseminate technological and non-technological innovation for social, economic, and ecological improvement in farming. Such improvements should be supported by higher education institutions by generating, transferring, and applying ideas, resources, and programs to local communities. Higher education institutions should work towards the integration of various types of knowledge and increase engagement with local farming needs. However, the willingness and trust of individuals as well as the lack of leveraging opportunities to innovate for sustainability were perceived as barriers. The key contribution of this study is to highlight and promote how innovation systems at small scales can support sustainability that may lead to a quintuple helix model (one that integrates the following five components: university, government, industry, civil society, and natural environment). The most important aspect of this study is the suggestion that the integration of social, ecological, and economic goals in innovation systems can help shape an approach that can reorganize innovation for sustainability. Such suggestions are described in the results and discussion sections.

This project explores how to use concatenated shapes as a way of creating inconstant garment constructions. The process starts wide by both testing chains, stitching and knots. But narrows down along the way to only focus on linked shapes without the use of stitches or glue. Different materials and shapes is tested to find a construction that not only hold together but also gives the user playfulness and the opportunity to easily change their own garment. Various forms were tested to be linked together, such as circle, rectangle, square, but also asymmetrical shapes. A choice was made to only focus on the circle to make the design process as focused as possible. Different ways in how to link the circle was tested, different scales, materials and colours. However did this round shape reach the end of the road and the investiga- tion resulted limited. In order to bring the project forward was the circle put aside. The process continued instead with classic clothing design as the basis for the shapes. This shapes resulted in a better variety and stronger garment reference. It opens up for more ways of concatenating garments and textile opportunities that are not restricted by the technique. Pieces that can be assembled in different ways by the user gives the wearer the opportunity to change the expression without buying a new garment. The pieces are also easier to recycle when there is no seams, zippers or other trimmings.

During the decade of 1950s, the intensive rural to urban migration, in search for new job opportunities, created a high housing demand that was partially solved by the dictatorial government of Marcos Perez Jimenez. However, in the absence of effective public policy and failed housing projects, the population started to create solutions of their own to satisfy their housing needs, settling themselves in an improvised way around the urbanized areas and constituting what we know today as informal settlements or barrios. By 1957, around 35% of the population of Caracas lived in barrios. During the past decade, Venezuela has experienced a series of changes that have modified the economic, political and social model that governed the country. During Chavez's government, there have been many policy changes regarding property, land, economic and social organization, in search for solutions to the housing problem that integrate the marginalized sector of the population. However, a different pattern of informal settlements has emerged. Some organized communities have started to invade not only vacant land in the city peripheries; they are now invading buildings that are inserted in the center of the city, contrasting to the formal systems already existing in the city. There is now a new interpretation of what is legal and what is not. We are experiencing the changes and understanding the consequences of their implementation. The purpose of this research is to understand the current processes of housing production and acquisition in formal and informal communities in Caracas through a review of existing literature and qualitative studies of the relationships between stakeholders. I analyze the new policies and the current housing production organization system and contrast it to what is actually happening in practice. I also investigated how incremental changes in existing practices can contribute to the development of safe and legible housing production processes. My recommendations are the result of hybrid systems that consider different actors and perspectives of the same reality in order to find a healthier and more sustainable building culture in Caracas. / text

As a tool for public health, sport and physical activity programs are challenged with sustainability after the initial resources and impetus that created them have subsided. Financial stability is important, but social and political support and consistent effort toward an agreed vision will also factor into whether a program will be sustainable. Program sustainability can be better understood when it is integrated with the phases of the program process, including formulation, implementation, and evaluation. Starting in 2008, the Texas Governor’s Advisory Council on Physical Fitness (GACPF) offered grants to local mayor’s fitness councils to tailor their own physical activity programs as a tool to combat obesity. In this work, I examine three community programs in Texas to illustrate what elements of sustainability were realized, and what achievements and challenges were experienced in the program process. This case study also serves as an opportunity to understand how sport and other physical activities are perceived in public health settings. Using a critical framework to draw out the assumptions and taken-for-granted knowledge of these public health programs, I employ a mixture of qualitative methods to determine what issues stood out in each community and what were common across all cases. I made site visits to each community and interviewed 42 people for this study, including members of the GACPF, members of the local mayor’s fitness councils, and residents in each community. The results reveal a significant drop-off in stakeholder involvement beyond program formulation. This drop-off largely explains why these programs were constrained in what could be implemented, went unevaluated, and had limited prospects for sustainability. The data also indicate that new approaches are needed for promoting greater levels of participation in sport and physical activity. Instead of emphasizing benefits of physical health or appearance, program leaders in public health should focus on the hedonic feeling and sense of community that can lead to more holistic health. The results reveal that it is unrealistic to contend that the challenges of sustaining a public health program can be completely eliminated. Nonetheless, an appreciation for those difficulties increases the possibility that they can be mitigated, and the public health program can be carried out as intended and sustained. / text

Universities are places where advanced education be taught, and also where pinner thoughts be conceived. Explorations and innovations in every field are spontaneous and highly encouraged, so does in field of Sustainable Architecture. Correspondingly, campus buildings should be considered as a carrier of knowledge, which can enlighten occupants in certain extents. Can the design of a Living Laboratory on Campus of the University of Texas at Austin facilitate student architectural sustainable explorations and innovations and contribute to campus sustainability socially and environmentally through the operation of interactive interchangeable building system? Specifically focusing on the University of Texas at Austin, this Master Design Study attempts to utilize a design process of a campus living laboratory to answer the questions above. It considered the lab as a platform for students to public their sustainable ideas and works, and get initial feedback from the occupants thereby. It would be especially benefit for university education and also for professional practice of students. / text

This research examines the practice of hillslope terracing in the state of Tlaxcala, Mexico. It explores how one popular terrace form, zanja-bordo (ditch-and-border) terraces, is employed in two distinct, though sometimes related contexts: (1) producing crops (agriculture) and (2) protecting natural resources (conservation). It first traces the use of zanja-bordo terraces in traditional agriculture in the region, highlighting some of the major elements of their form and function, issues surrounding their antiquity, and their possible role in the landscape degradation so prevalent in the region today. Moving from this agricultural context, the dissertation next examines the role of zanja-bordo terraces in landscape restoration efforts in Tlaxcala. It demonstrates the key role that active and prolonged maintenance plays in long-term efforts to restore previously degraded farmland back to productive capacity. The dissertation then examines more broadly how government programs to promote zanja-bordo terracing in the region impact farmers, whose ancestors have been building zanja-bordo terraces for centuries. Findings from the collection, synthesis, analysis, and groundtruthing of written data on governmental terracing projects in the state reveal that while perhaps well intentioned, these programs did little to promote sustainable agricultural development or environmental conservation in the region. Finally, the dissertation moves above the 3,000-meter mark to examine the relatively recent phenomenon of high-elevation terracing in Mexico's national parks. Conceived as a means of erosion mitigation, water conservation, reforestation, and even fire suppression, government agencies now construct zanja-bordo terraces throughout the understory of many of Mexico's subalpine forests. A case study of the la Malinche (Malintzi or Matlalcueyatl) National Protected Area illustrates some of the difficulties in examining each of the claimed benefits of terracing in these environments. Whether for agriculture or restoration, as a techno-developmental strategy, or as a tool for soil and water conservation, zanja-bordo terraces are shown to be an adaptable and effective hillslope management technology. This dissertation demonstrates, however, that successful adaptation and implementation of zanja-bordo technologies into different contexts largely depends on the effective planning, monitoring, and maintenance of terrace structures and processes. Ultimately, the sustainability of zanja-bordo terracing relates more to issues of contextualization and human motivation than to questions of technological innovation. / text

This dissertation deals with three issues that are important to many firms, namely, volatile commodity prices, environmental regulations, and globalization. In the first essay I study the benefit and the coordination of inventory sharing when there are two existing channels for procurement, i.e., the spot and forward markets. I propose a method for sharing inventory such that the decentralized firms get the same benefit per unit of the sharing transactions regardless of whether the firm is borrowing or lending. The procurement cost gap between the centralized and decentralized cases is dramatically small by using this method. In the second essay, I analyze whether imposing carbon costs to retailers and consumers changes the supply chain design or social welfare. I consider three types of players who want to maximize different objectives and three kinds of competitive settings. Different from previous studies, I show that the supply chain design is changed significantly by imposing carbon costs especially when market competition is medium to high. In the third essay, I consider long-term / short-term strategies of multi-national corporations. For the long-term strategy, I show that the correlation between the exchange rate and the market demand in a foreign country affects plant location. For the short-term strategy, I show that manufacturers increase the inventory levels as the exchange rate of the country where the plant is located grows weaker. I confirm these results empirically using plant-level data of Korean multi-national corporations provided by the Export-Import Bank of Korea. / text

Sustainability is a hot topic for years and sustainability assessment has been generally used as an approach to assess the level of sustainability. For the effect of general products to the development of sustainability, there are existing assessment frameworks in use. However, they are either environmental-focused, or relied mainly on life cycle assessment approach, which has many deficiencies especially in the social aspect. In this paper, history of development of sustainability and relevant principles related to sustainability are extensively reviewed. Those relevant in the context of product assessment, like the nested model of sustainability, strong sustainability, precautionary principle, design of environmental sustainability and sustainability assessment and measurement principles (BellagioSTAMP), are chosen as the foundation theories of development of the new product sustainability assessment framework. Even though the focus is put into assessment of social aspect of sustainability, the framework is designed for the assessment of overall sustainability. The framework comprises of a list of guiding principles, vision and goals and an assessment process. It is suitable for the evaluation of any product, no matter it is in conceptual stage, design stage or already in the market. It can be used for company in any level of maturity in sustainability assessment through allowing them to define their own position and targets. A standard list of measurement is defined and can be used for any product, while product-specific measurement can be defined within the process. A case study is done using iPad2and every step in the process is gone through. The pilot study proves that the framework is logical, easy to use and practical enough to help identifying what needs to be done to contribute into sustainability. Issues are identified in the process of pilot study, including the lifecycle for some products is too short for a meaningful review and remediation follow up; social impacts could be associated with the whole series of product or the general technology instead of specific product under assessment; the comment given by participants in survey or focus group meeting may come from perceived impact instead of actual impact; knock-on effect to other existing products and services may be neglected; and the potential for companies to pretend they are contributing to sustainability but actually not. Nevertheless, these issues are not difficult to be resolved. Future research agenda includes handling of cumulative effect from sales of the product, formalizing the professional qualification of sustainability assessor and improving the practicality of economic and environmental sustainability assessment through the proposed framework. Through this paper, with the creation of a new and practical product sustainability assessment framework, it is believed that the effect of products on sustainability can be evaluated and actions can be identified for them to contribute into sustainability development. / published_or_final_version / Environmental Management / Master / Master of Science in Environmental Management