Consideration of sustainability in product and industrial design courses is becoming more common and relevant within higher education in the UK. However little is known about how widespread the teaching is and what is actually understood as sustainable design with discrepancies in the definitions used in different institutions. Literature highlights that many universities now engage with the tangible environmental aspects of sustainable design, whilst the intangible social aspects are left unaddressed. This thesis explores methods for encouraging and enabling students to address the social aspects within sustainable product design (SPD) education. The first research stage presents the results of a nationwide survey, which investigated how widely SPD is taught, which social aspects are addressed, how SPD is taught and assessed and the attitudes and awareness of it amongst academics. The second research stage presents further research into best practice in SPD through detailed interviews with leading academics in the field. A third research stage built upon the findings from both these studies, and sought to address a perceived weakness in SPD education; the lack of understanding and consideration of the social aspects in sustainable product design in teaching and project outcomes. Three Rethinking Design workshops were developed and tested at five universities in the UK and Ireland. These workshops were designed to introduce students to the wider social aspects of SPD, through the use of audio visual group based workshops. The design of the workshops enabled a learning environment where a deep understanding of the social aspects of Sustainable Product Design could be developed through; group work, discussion and critical reflection, which led to students exploring design thinking responses, suggesting that deep learning, had occurred.

Social planning has remained a longstanding element of urban planning practice and continues to be pursued through different institutional structures in Canada. While the City of Winnipeg currently features no municipal social planning department, the City of Vancouver attempts to support its most disadvantaged neighbourhoods through its municipal sector. As these are two cities with high concentrations of Indigenous populations, this research uncovers the degree to which these two social planning models have worked to support the particular needs and interests of residents living in Winnipeg’s North End and Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. Through the comparative case study of these two research sites, comprehensive document analysis and semi-structured interviews with key informants from planning agencies in each city, it is evident both models promote socially just and socially sustainable planning processes and outcomes within their respective neighbourhoods. However, neither is without fault. As a government body Vancouver is able to create and track progress in a more systemic way, setting targets and metrics for other government agencies, while information sharing and relationship building are where non-profit organizations in Winnipeg truly excel. This research explains how most non-profit organizations are unable to successfully sustain themselves, while municipal departments lack the rapport grassroots organizations more easily attain. Therefore, an integration of both models could begin to better support Canada’s most disadvantaged neighbourhoods with growing urban Indigenous populations. / May 2016

Economic growth is often linked to service economy. Sustainable economic growth is based upon economic, environmental and social sustainability. Some argue that economic and environmental sustainability has its foundation on social sustainability. By analysing the effects of service economy on society, one can identify potential threats to social sustainability. Theoretical analysis is supported by historical events from around the world focusing on highlighting threats that service economy countries are exposed to.Findings were that while on short term post-industrial economies boost development and sustainability, on long term countries are facing challenges in terms of ageing population, sustainable communities and access to social equity. Furthermore, depending on local policies, in some cases a trade-off is needed among factors in order to reach the highest level of social sustainability.

This bachelor thesis in sociology is based on participatory observation and interviews in Mauritius done by two Swedish students who are studying Social change and social sustainability at the University of Halmstad. The aim of this study was to understand the social conditions that affect the organization Young Queer Alliance and their work to monitor and secure human rights regarding discrimination against sexual orientation in Mauritius today. The aim was also to see if Young Queer Alliance has opportunities for change towards a more socially sustainable society regarding this discrimination. The material has been interpreted and analysed by us through Foucault’s theory of power (2008), Jönhill’s dichotomy inclusion/exclusion (2012) and social mobilization (Sundh & Turunen, 2000). In some sections, we have done parallels between Mauritius and Sweden. The result of the empirical collection is complex and multidimensional and showed that; homophobia, religions, traditions, heterosexual norms and government influence the social circumstances for the organization. Paradoxically, a new thinking generation is emerging influenced by globalization and its processes. The “not-knowing-mentality” causes discrimination and can be prevailed with education. The thesis concludes that; the mentality is based on traditional norms and is influenced by history. Our generation cannot change history, but the future is ours to write.

Although sustainability within human resource management has increasingly received attention amongst scholars and practitioners, not enough has been done to demonstrate how the concept of Sustainable HRM translates into practice. In the light of digitalization and globalization, knowledge-based actors within the modern business environment are facing rapid changes whereby the retainment of valuable skills and competencies has become crucial for ensuring competitive advantage. On the individual level, knowledge- based workers encounter challenges such as work intensification, extensive availability and work-life-balance when conforming with the changing nature of work. In addition, since employees’ loyalty and demands are continuously shifting, the concept of EmployerAttractiveness is becoming a larger strategic concern for knowledge-based firms. Employer Attractiveness also serves as one of the primary reasons for linking Sustainability with HRM. From the overlapping problem backgrounds of Sustainable HRM and Employer Attractiveness this study found a research gap which formulated the research question of this study:   “How can Sustainable HRM contribute to Employer Attractiveness?”    The purpose of this study serves to create an understanding of how Sustainable HRM is practiced and how it in turn contributes to Employer Attractiveness in terms of employee retainment. A qualitative inductive approach was undertaken to fulfil this purpose, in which nine semi-structured interviews with consultants and HR-workers belonging to small-and medium sized firms acknowledged as attractive employers was conducted. The interviews and empirical findings were structured accordingly with the core components of Sustainable HRM. The key findings retrieved highlights the interconnectedness between the four Sustainable HRM dimensions; long-term, impact, substance and partnership orientations, and the five values; application, development, economic, interest, social, used for assessing Employer Attractiveness. Based upon the analysis, a conceptual model was established to demonstrate how Sustainable HRM, influenced by its context, can contribute to employee-perceived Employer Attractiveness. This study theoretically contributes a further understanding of the concepts of Sustainable HRM and Employer Attractiveness respectively and combined, by introducing new figures and models valuable for the existing field of research. In practical terms, this study offers valuable managerial insights of how leaders and firms should view Sustainable HRM an integrative part of the entire firm alongside with recognizing the strategic potential of sustainability within HRM in terms of Employer Attractiveness. On a societal level, this study addresses the importance of raising more attention to the employees as key stakeholders within the social dimension of sustainability.

This study aims to shed a light over the challenges, possibilities and problems regarding renovation and rehabilitation of the million program housing. Many million program housing is in acute need of restoration and the monetary cost is high since the housings represent one fourth of the Swedish housing. This will be from a social sustainability perspective and investigate how different parts of the property owners incorporate social sustainability during their changes and modifications in their projects. While visiting these strategies and looking into the social sustainability a issue is also due to see if there is any overall dialog between companies in order to share information and experiences. Qualitative methods were used to conduct this study, even more specific interviews with following thematic analysis. The results found that the strategies for public utility and private housing differs when it comes to renovation million program housings. They operate in different practical methods and has difference in the ambitions of social sustainability. Three actors from different branches in the million program housing is interview to contain different perspectives to widen the reach and deepen the analysis on how the problems and strategies should be perceived and what they struggle with and find promising for the future.

People all over the world have always been sharing things and experiences but due to rapid technological development, new digital platforms emerged which led to a new way of sharing and the phenomenon sharing economy started to be a common concept. The purpose of this study is to explore how Turistrådet Västsveriges newly launched platform Meet the locals could contribute to increased social and economic sustainability. Using existing theories such as sense of place, types of tourists and the host-tourist relationship this was done through multiple interviews together with locals in the project Meet the locals - a platform where you are given opportunities to ‘explore the Swedish lifestyle from a local perspective’. The data collected from the interviews were transcribed and analyzed using the thematic analysis which aimed to find connections with the chosen themes based on the theories. These themes were; place attachment, the meeting between host and tourist and sustainability. The results in this study establish that sustainability is important for the locals interviewed. However, it is unclear how Meet the locals really are contributing to social and economic sustainability since sustainability is still a complex subject and the project itself is still growing.

In this paper, a study was conducted to explore social sustainability in HCI. The study focuses on people in destructive relationships and uses the notion of research through design to gain and share knowledge using design patterns. The study focused on creating methods for working more practically with social sustainability in HCI and used several design methods such as story share and capture to gain and share knowledge on the user group which was then presented in a pattern, consisting of a total of eight different patterns. The patterns was later tested with designers who suggested designs which users were then to rate from best to worst. The study show that design patterns can successfully be used to share knowledge, however the study also show some variation in how well design patterns are understood based on experience. Experienced designers tend to create better designs with the pattern than inexperienced. However, designers with the pattern designed better solutions than designers without regardless of experience.

Significant literature on sustainable supply chain management exists but there is a lack of theory explaining diffusion of sustainability practices within the supplier base led by manufacturing firms. In particular diffusion theory is insufficiently developed to characterise the development of sustainability practices in suppliers. The purpose of this research is to establish the conditions for enhancing the diffusion of environmental and social sustainability practices across the supplier base from the buying firms’ perspective. The research design is based on a theory building strategy. The data analysis was carried out based on a triangulation of different sources of data (e.g. 30 interviews with directors or managers of four sustainability leading manufacturing firms from the beverage, cosmetic and textile sector, and an extensive array of documents) and cross-case analysis and application of diffusion of innovation theory (DoI). This research identified environmental and social practices diffused through supplier selection (implementation of requirements), performance assessment and development. This map of sustainability practices provides a unique perspective; hence it distinguishes practices diffused across different supply chain tiers, as well as the mechanism/initiatives employed to diffuse them. The findings suggested that more emphasis was given to environmental practices than social practices. In general, social practices were more related to compulsory level (e.g. human rights) and were evaluated (selection), monitored (performance) and diffused through development (especially educating initiatives) in both 1st tier and 2nd tier. Critical materials suppliers in the 2nd tier were more likely to be engaged by specific procurement teams through the selection, performance and development activities, especially with the aim of meeting compliance and improving performance. The findings also suggested that joint initiatives with critical industrial suppliers focused more on environmental practices. Diffusion of innovation theory was applied to consider different elements that have not been covered in the literature, for instance, emphasis on communication channels and social system elements. The rate of adoption of sustainability practices was directly affected by supporting suppliers in measuring and collaborating in implementing improvements plans, as well as intense educating initiatives. DoI provides a powerful lens to help explain the role of buying firms in the diffusion of sustainability practices. The research provided a more comprehensive view on how sustainability practices were diffused through the supplier selection, performance assessment and development. This work is the first instance of considering intra- and interorganisational factors in the same model for enhancing the diffusion of sustainability practices. Overall, this depicts patterns of the factors and points out the most critical variables influencing the implementation of sustainability practices across the supplier base. This research has the potential to serve as an analysis tool to uncover gaps in activity that could lead to greater adoption of sustainability practices by suppliers, as well as gathering good practice in a structured way.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-10T10:45:09Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 CLEONICE MENEZES BARBOSA.pdf: 896025 bytes, checksum: 4d6c5e760dff86475b3171b758c073c2 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2007-12-18 / The starting point of this essay was to investigate the correlation between business development on the capitalist production range marks with ergonomy and social sustainability. Theoretical knowledge about sustainability was researched; factory ground floor work conditions, especially involving its relation with the machinery; and the ergonomy while science and practice that seeks better manners of interaction among men versus machine. Social Security Information was researched about the incidence of workrelated diseases such as: reason: body parts involved; quantity of layoffs and granted benefits; age of greater incidence. It was used the Economical Activities National Code (CNAE) empowered by Receita Federal in all states, including the state of Goiás. In order to understand practically what happens inside an agro-industry that might lead to the insurgence of occupational diseases that compromise society, the state and the economy, an in-loco study was made. In this study we ll see the result of 02 years working on the attachment of theory and practice of ergonomy: the difficulties on implementing a philosophy that has three important factors as principle (comfort, security and efficiency), conciliated to the capitalism main goal which is production, having the workingman struggle against managements and leaderships as the back scenario. / O ponto de partida desta dissertação foi investigar a correlação entre o desenvolvimento empresarial nos marcos do modo de produção capitalista, com a ergonomia e com a sustentabilidade social. Buscou-se conhecimento das teorias sobre sustentabilidade; as condições de trabalho no chão de fábrica, envolvendo, sobretudo sua relação com a máquina; e a ergonomia enquanto ciência e prática que busca a melhor maneira de interação entre homem versus máquina. Buscou-se informação no site da Previdência Social sobre a incidência de doenças relacionadas ao trabalho tais como: motivo; partes do corpo envolvidas; quantidade de afastamentos e benefícios concedidos; e idade de maior incidência. Utilizou-se o Código Nacional de Atividades Econômicas (CNAE) empregadas pela Receita Federal em todos os Estados, inclusive para o estado de Goiás. Para entender na prática, o que acontece dentro de uma agroindústria que podem levar ao aparecimento de doenças ocupacionais que comprometem a sociedade, o Estado e a economia, realizou-se um estudo de caso in loco. O que será conferido neste estudo foi o resultado de 02 anos de trabalhado aliando teoria e prática de ergonomia: as dificuldades em se implantar uma filosofia que tem como princípio três fatores importantes (conforto, segurança e eficiência), conciliado ao objetivo do capitalismo que é produção, tendo como pano de fundo as lutas dos trabalhadores com gerências e lideranças.