The commercial field of sustainability communications encompasses ground previously demarcated between the fields of Corporate Social Responsibility on the one hand, and marketing, advertising and public relations on the other. This thesis examines the formation and development of this novel field of cultural production and its significance for sustainable consumption and corporate sustainability. The research is orientated by practice theory and draws on participant observation within a sustainability communications agency, interviews and documentary analysis. The heuristic value of practice theory for the study of sustainable consumption is now well established in the context of end-use consumption but is unexplored in the context of commercial sustainability communications. Equally, sustainability communications has been neglected by the field of cultural economy. The key concern is with cultural intermediaries and their capacity or otherwise to instantiate their own mores, understandings and practices in the social world. I address this in terms of sustainability and draw on the idea of performativity to approach commercial sustainability communications as a performative complex of practices. Furthermore, the research aims to problematise the place of 'the consumer' in discourses of sustainable consumption. I produce a genealogy of sustainability communications and an account of the development and contemporary constitution of the associated agency market. I suggest that a defining role that the market plays is the management of the 'strategic ambiguity' of sustainability. Drawing on fieldwork and interviews I identify elements that integrate practices into the complex of sustainability communications and examine its normative orientations. Cultural intermediation is shown to take place through, firstly, the diffusion of practices and practice elements. Secondly, it occurs through attempts to instantiate 'the sustainable consumer'. Models of the consumer at work in sustainability communications are analysed and different modes of instantiation of 'the sustainable consumer' identified. Thirdly, it takes place through articulating sustainability with brands. I explore three arenas in which sustainability communications articulates brand and sustainability: what I identify as the discourse of corporate-sponsored sustainable consumption; the cultural politics of work; and lastly, the public sphere.

Företag inom slow fashion arbetar mer med hållbarhet, både för konsumenterna och deras anställda. Det är stort fokus på att miljön ska bevaras medan företagen konkurrerar med fast fashionkedjor som massproducerar kläder och säljer till låga priser. Det stora problemet inom industrins produktion handlar om hur man ska försöka minska utsläpp och påverkan på miljön samt hantera överkonsumtionen genom hållbar marknadsföring. Studiens syfte är att utvärdera vilka karaktärsdrag slow fashion företag har gentemot fast fashion företag och hur slow fashion företag inom klädindustrin marknadsför sitt hållbarhetsarbete till konsumenterna. Studien undersöker även hur företagen arbetar med marknadsföring för att nå ut till sina nuvarande och framtida konsumenter. Studien har en kvalitativ ansats och det empiriska materialet samlas in genom semistrukturerade intervjuer med fyra slow fashion företag. Vi har även samlat in empiriskt material genom undersökningar av företagens offentliga material så som hemsidor och sociala medier för att komplettera intervjuerna. Resultatet analyseras med hjälp av tidigare forskning och begreppen slow- jämfört med fast fashion och marknadsföring. Vidare analyseras företagens ansvar med hjälp av begrepp och modeller inom triple bottom line, corporate social responsibility, certifieringar och legitimitet. Det sista inom studien som analyseras är konsumentens ansvar i form av politisk konsumtion samt aktiviteterna bojkott och buycott. Resultaten visar att alla fyra företagen är positiva till att arbeta med hållbarhet för att förbättra miljön och deras arbete kommer inte avta men att företagen vill nå ut till fler konsumenter och minska konsumtionen genom att påverka konsumenterna till att göra färre onödiga inköp. / Slow fashion companies work more with sustainability, both for consumers and their employees. There is a strong focus on preserving the environment while companies compete with fast fashion chains that mass-produce clothes and sell at low prices. The big problem in industrial production is about how to try to reduce emissions and impact on the environment and manage overconsumption through sustainable marketing. The purpose of the study is to evaluate the characteristics of slow fashion companies in relation to fast fashion companies and how slow fashion companies in the clothing industry market their sustainability work to consumers. The study also examines how companies work with marketing to reach their current and future consumers. The study has a qualitative approach, and the empirical material is collected through semistructured interviews with four slow fashion companies. We have also collected empirical material through studies of the companies' public material such as websites and social media to supplement the interviews. The results are analyzed with the help of previous research and the concepts of slow- vs. fast fashion and marketing. Furthermore, corporate responsibility is analyzed with the help of concepts and models within triple results, corporate social responsibility, certifications, and legitimacy. The last thing in the study that is analyzed is the consumer's responsibility in the form of political consumption and the activities boycott and buycott. Results show that all four companies are positive about working with sustainability because the environment and their work will decline, but that the companies want to reach more consumers and choose consumption by influencing consumers to make fewer unnecessary purchases.