The objective of this thesis is to identify how to take advantage of opportunities – in the construction sector in specific – to contribute to sustainable development at an early stage of intervention in disaster-affected areas. To this aim, the thesis develops a "framework for sustainability", distilling the literature on sustainable, disaster recovery into a succinct set of criteria for the planning and/or evaluation of recovery programmes. What is unique about this framework is its intended suitability to the field of construction in particular. The framework is tested in the thesis against two "case study projects" in construction in disaster areas. Data on these two projects, which took place in the Marmara Region of Turkey, was collected over a period of fieldwork. The findings, arranged in the chronological order of each project's planning/design, implementation, and maintenance, are presented in the latter part of the thesis. This is followed by an analysis chapter, which uses the proposed framework to evaluate the experiences of the two projects. The thesis concludes that sustainable recovery may indeed be supported from an early stage of construction initiatives, by concentrating not only on constructed products, but more importantly, on the construction process itself.

published_or_final_version / Environmental Management / Master / Master of Science in Environmental Management

published_or_final_version / Urban Planning / Master / Master of Science in Urban Planning

Many tools have been developed to assess global, national or regional sustainable development policies. However, as governments develop sustainable policies, individuals must also feel empowered to affect their personal impact on the planet. This thesis integrates three sustainability concepts that lend themselves to individual sustainability: The natural step, life cycle assessment, and the ecological footprint. TNS serves to provide the meaning and substance toward sustainable development. LCA helps provide the framework for assessing sustainability. The EF calculator determines the driving components and measures the qualitative decisions made through TNS and LCA. From the analysis of the household footprint calculator a simplified footprint calculator was developed to assist individuals and communities in setting benchmarks and goals as they move away from over-consumption and towards a sustainable lifestyle.

Humanity confronts an existential threat without historic precedent. Environmental pressures have reached such intensity and pace of change that the earth system may be irreversibly tipped into a new and unpredictable state. The emerging global reality is, in turn, redefining overall conditions for business success. Addressing these challenges both demands and brings great opportunities for innovation. An important and sometimes neglected aspect of innovation is the design or redesign of business models, which has been identified as a greater source of lasting competitive advantage than new products and services per se. The business model has also been suggested as a new unit of analysis when discussing sustainability. However, this is still a relatively underexplored area. The aim of this work was therefore to develop an approach to business model design that supports strategic sustainable development, i.e., supports organizations to contribute to society’s transition towards sustainability in a way that strengthens the organization.       To be able to design a business model that supports strategic sustainable development, it is necessary to know what sustainability is and how to develop sustainability-promoting, economically viable strategies. Therefore, the Framework for Strategic Sustainable Development, which includes, e.g., an operational definition of sustainability and strategic guidelines for how to approach it, was used as an overarching framework. Specific research methods and techniques included, e.g., literature reviews, questionnaires, interviews, work with focus groups, participatory action research with partner organizations, creative problem solving techniques, modeling, and simulation.   The literature reviews revealed potential sustainability benefits of developing business models in conjunction with product-service systems (PSS). However, a knowledge gap exists regarding how to effectively connect these fields. Arguably, PSS strategies can best contribute to sustainability when business models support their implementation and when both the business models and the PSS strategies are guided by an understanding of strategic sustainable development. Therefore, an integrated approach to Business Model Design for Strategic Sustainable Development was co-developed and tested in PSS innovation work with partners, e.g., companies within the energy and lighting sectors. The tests indicated that the new approach helped to clarify strengths and weaknesses of current business models from a strategic sustainability perspective; to transform an organization’s vision and strategy into a sustainability-framed vision and a sustainability-promoting strategy; and to communicate the new vision and strategy to the value network as a basis for engaging important stakeholders in the change. For example, the approach supported one of the partner companies in its transformation towards providing sustainable PSS solutions in the form of light as a service. Examples of business benefits of the new approach include improved scalability and risk avoidance, which provide a foundation for better investment strategies. Benefits also include improved differentiability and a broadened view on, and a more solid foundation for, collaboration with stakeholders that are increasingly important to sustainable business success.

My diploma thesis is focused on sustainable tourism development, with particular emphasis on district Kutná Hora. There is examined the concept of sustainable development, then in greater detail the development of sustainable tourism, which is followed by analysis of the current state of tourism in the area and then an analysis of sustainable tourism in Kutná Hora. The thesis examines the current state of tourism in the area with an emphasis on its sustainability in the future.

Doctoral research dissertation in the fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Marketing at the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa, 2016 / Globally, a vision exists of an economy which produces social, environmental and economic benefits, viz-a-viz three pillars of sustainable development, for all the individuals, communities and society at large. It also focuses on the development of the sustainable use of natural resources, to achieve a greater enviable society, therefore giving rise to the green economy (Bigg 2011). To make businesses sustainable, companies are increasingly focusing on green innovation, sustainable business solutions and re-inventing their business models, and expanding to untapped markets such as the bottom of the pyramid (BOP), consisting of more than four billion potential consumers (Farinelli, Bottini, Akkoyunlu & Aerni, 2011). Most research shows growth opportunities of green products in the bottom of pyramid (Olsen & Boxenbaum, 2009), and has increasingly created deliberations all over the world. Also, companies from both developed and developing countries are becoming increasingly interested in BOP. To successfully target the BOP with ‘green’ technologies, companies focus their business models on innovation, sustainability and economic profit, instead of gross margins (Prahalad & Hart, 2008). Very limited research evidence is present that links all these concepts together. And therefore, created an interest to examine how integration of green technology bring changes in business model innovation (BMI) for sustainability at BOP markets. The linkage between concepts - BMI, BOP and green technology, to bring sustainable development, has not been sufficiently explored, and especially with focus on emerging economies like South Africa and India. Therefore, the present research has three fold purposes. Firstly, to analyse and understand factors affecting the existing business models of various companies with green technologies targeting BOP markets for sustainable development. Secondly, the research brings an identification and understanding of number of key factors related to BMI, BOP markets and green technologies for sustainable development, and proposes a conceptual framework based on a series of underpinning relationships among these factors. Thirdly, it testifies the conceptualized theoretical framework on green business model innovation for sustainable development for BOP markets, among large companies. The primary objective of research study is to design a right green business model innovation across companies with green technologies for BOP markets. The secondary objective is to identify and compare the differences and similarities of green business model innovation for BOP markets of both South Africa and India. The present research undertakes a sequential exploratory mixed method approach, and is carried out in three phases: Phase 1: Exploration and study of business model innovation of identified industries/sectors with green technologies, targeting BOP segment for sustainable development, using qualitative research methods to formulate multiple cases. Phase 2: Identification of underpinning factors related to BMI, sustainable development and BOP consumers for green technologies; using qualitative methods and content analysis of results from phase 1, leading to design and development of theoretical framework of green business model innovation for South Africa and India. Phase 3: Testing of conceptualized framework of green business model innovation for sustainable development, using quantitative research methods. The present research tests underpinning factors of emerging green business model innovation for sustainable development, resulting from the qualitative phase, and is used to expand and generalize qualitative findings by using quantitative methods. The findings resulted in linking three theoretical emerging topics in the literature: business model innovation (BMI), green technology for sustainability and BOP. Four cases are developed through 33 face-to-face in-depth interviews with company top executives, using multiple case study approach. Each case comprised of sustainable business model innovation, representing comparison between South Africa and India, across four industries, namely, Energy, Banking, FMCG/Durable sectors and Cloud Computing. Qualitative content analysis and findings resulted in formation of themes and sub-themes and proposed prepositions, depicting the relationship between BMI, BOP, and green technology for sustainability. These prepositions aided in development of conceptual framework and proposed nine hypotheses. The conceptual model is quantitatively surveyed on 206 employees of large companies with focus on BOP markets. The quantitative findings supported all nine hypotheses. Therefore, indicating that integration of green technology is associated with performance of green product/service innovation and green process innovation in a company. Likewise, business model innovation variables; customer interface, infrastructure management and financial aspects, positively impacts sustainability of business model. The contribution of this thesis is in the development of green business model innovation for sustainable development, with focus on BOP markets. This adds to the contextual knowledge and empirical literature on business model innovation, green technologies and BOP markets. Theoretically, it brings better understanding of these concepts, and provides a basis of further research highlighting the importance of innovation while taking account of green economy and BOP. The findings provide marketing practitioners with better understanding of strategies that can be employed to innovate and change their own business models to incorporate green and sustainable initiative for BOP markets. / XL2018

In a world that is changing rapidly due to the social and environmental consequences of the unsustainable economic growth, societal and economic transformations from unsustainable visions and practices are inevitable. While there is a need to develop alternative approaches to production and consumption, changing these systems is not feasible without changing the mainstream marketing ideas and its practices where the main incentive is “how to sell more”. The initial phase of the research process supports conceptual clarity and the evolution of marketing thought towards sustainability marketing. It identifies the presence of sustainability marketing in the existing marketing curriculum through qualitative content analysis using grounded theory and quasi-statistical approaches, that facilitates the search for sustainability in marketing curriculum based on UNESCO’s indicative learning objectives for promoting Education for Sustainable Development. The thesis draws on relevant literature in the marketing field, utilizing the content analysis of various syllabi and mandatory literature of Uppsala University’s marketing courses, as well as employing semi-structured interviews with five lecturers of Uppsala University’s Marketing faculty and eight marketing students from across Sweden. The institutional setup of the case of Uppsala University is found to be problematic when considering its commitments towards sustainable development and its Action Plan for Sustainable Development 2019–2021. The study established the strong influence of dominant social paradigm in the curriculum development of marketing courses, which was evident through the content analysis and portrayals of the respondents’ perspectives of the marketing faculty. Further, it was found that the societal understanding of marketing dictates what can be taught in marketing education, which consequently circumscribes what can be researched in marketing. In addition, the concept of sustainability marketing was found to be nonexistent in mandatory literature of the courses, and was poorly covered throughout the secondary literature. Similarly, most of the mandatory literature of the marketing courses of Uppsala University do not follow UNESCO’s (2017) indicative learning objectives for promoting ESD, and hence do not promote learning for sustainable development. The results of this thesis suggest that we still have a long way to go to bring Education for Sustainable Development into marketing education, as current mainstream marketing practices and its rationale with dominant social paradigm prevalence maintains, supports and exacerbates the global unsustainable consumption and production patterns.

The world currently has more people living in cities than in rural areas. In the United States this is no exception, and as a result government policy is focusing on the supply of 'green' jobs that help repair and expand its infrastructure in an attempt to help curb non-renewable resource use. The expansion of public transportation throughout the country is one facet of the multi-pronged US government policy. In the tri-county area of South Florida (Palm Beach County, Broward County, and Miami-Dade County) a research study known as the South Florida East Coast Corridor Transit Analysis (SFECCTA) entered Phase 2 in January 2009. This study looks at incorporating the FEC freight corridor which transverses the downtown areas of 47 cities into a major North- South commuter system. This system would also supplement the existing commuter Tri- Rail corridor. The proposed methodology in this manuscript attempts to address the issue of providing an adaptable, efficient and convenient public transportation in a low to medium density environment where the automobile is the preferred mode of travel. Emphasis is placed on connecting existing origin and destination locations in and around the greater West Palm Beach metropolitan area in Palm Beach County, FL. The goal of the methodology is to establish potential routes that will connect high amounts of residence to places of social interaction, consumption, employment, and the proposed SFECCTA regional transportation system with Light Rail Transit as the end goal. As a result the proposed corridors focus on creating dedicated and shared right of ways that already exist via the road network. The discussion and conclusion provide methodology successes, improvements, and economic development recommendations. / by Dylan Kennard. / Vita. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2009. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2009. Mode of access: World Wide Web.

Chan Chung Shing. / Thesis submitted in: June 2005. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 99-110). / Abstracts and questionnaires in English and Chinese. / Abstract --- p.i / Acknowledgement --- p.iii / List of Tables --- p.ix / List of Figures --- p.x / List of Appendices --- p.xi / Chapter CHAPTER 1 --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- Urban park management in Hong Kong --- p.1 / Chapter 1.2 --- Conceptual framework of the study --- p.3 / Chapter 1.3 --- Objectives of the study --- p.5 / Chapter 1.4 --- Scope and significance of the study --- p.6 / Chapter 1.5 --- Organization of the thesis --- p.8 / Chapter CHAPTER 2 --- LITERATURE REVIEW --- p.10 / Chapter 2.1 --- Definitions and typologies of urban parks --- p.10 / Chapter 2.2 --- Multi-dimensional functions of urban parks to livable and sustainable cities --- p.13 / Chapter 2.3 --- The need for recreation management frameworks and indicators of urban parks --- p.16 / Chapter 2.4 --- Definition and functions of indicators in recreation management --- p.18 / Chapter 2.5 --- Studies of indicators in park management and their implications --- p.20 / Chapter 2.6 --- Summary --- p.25 / Chapter CHAPTER 3 --- BACKGROUND OF STUDY AREA --- p.27 / Chapter 3.1 --- History and management of urban parks in Hong Kong --- p.27 / Chapter 3.2 --- Classifications of the major parks in Hong Kong --- p.28 / Chapter 3.3 --- Site selection of the study --- p.33 / Chapter 3.4 --- Baseline data of urban parks --- p.34 / Chapter 3.5 --- Summary --- p.36 / Chapter CHAPTER 4 --- METHODOLOGY --- p.37 / Chapter 4.1 --- Methods of data and information collection --- p.37 / Chapter 4.1.1 --- First stage (In-depth interviews and questionnaire survey) --- p.38 / Chapter 4.1.2 --- Second stage (Questionnaire surveys) --- p.40 / Chapter 4.1.3 --- Modified Delphi approach --- p.41 / Chapter 4.2 --- Methods of data analysis --- p.42 / Chapter 4.2.1 --- Matrix frameworks --- p.42 / Chapter 4.2.2 --- Importance-performance (I-P) analysis --- p.43 / Chapter 4.2.3 --- Factor analysis --- p.44 / Chapter 4.2.4 --- Driving force-State-Response (DSR) framework --- p.45 / Chapter 4.3 --- Summary --- p.46 / Chapter CHAPTER 5 --- RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS I - Indicators for Sustainable Urban Parks in Hong Kong --- p.48 / Chapter 5.1 --- Results --- p.48 / Chapter 5.1.1 --- Characteristics of park managers and park users --- p.48 / Chapter 5.1.2 --- Visitation characteristics of park users --- p.51 / Chapter 5.1.3 --- Core indicators extracted based on the perception of park users --- p.52 / Chapter 5.2 --- Discussions --- p.54 / Chapter 5.2.1 --- Characteristics of respondents and implications on park management --- p.54 / Chapter 5.2.2 --- Components of urban park management selected in studies --- p.55 / Chapter 5.2.3 --- Components extracted for frequent and non-frequent park users --- p.57 / Chapter 5.3 --- Recommendations --- p.58 / Chapter 5.3.1 --- Development and implementation of urban park indicators --- p.58 / Chapter 5.3.2 --- DSR Framework for sustainable urban park management --- p.61 / Chapter 5.4 --- Summary --- p.64 / Chapter CHAPTER 6 --- RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS II - Indicator Ratings between Park Managers and Park Users --- p.65 / Chapter 6.1 --- Results --- p.65 / Chapter 6.1.1 --- Rankings of importance of indicators by park managers and park users --- p.65 / Chapter 6.1.2 --- Rankings of performance of indicators by park managers and park users --- p.67 / Chapter 6.1.3 --- Ranking of indicators by frequent and non-frequent park users --- p.69 / Chapter 6.2 --- Discussions --- p.70 / Chapter 6.2.1 --- Discrepancies between the perceptions of park managers and park users --- p.70 / Chapter 6.2.2 --- Park management problems caused by discrepancies between stakeholders --- p.72 / Chapter 6.2.3 --- Causes of discrepancies --- p.73 / Chapter 6.2.4 --- Park users' perception of urban parks' performance --- p.73 / Chapter 6.3 --- Recommendations --- p.74 / Chapter 6.3.1 --- Public participation of urban park management issues --- p.74 / Chapter 6.3.2 --- Multi-stakeholders' approach in urban park management --- p.75 / Chapter 6.4 --- Summary --- p.76 / Chapter CHAPTER 7 --- RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS III - Importance-Performance of Indicators in Urban Parks --- p.77 / Chapter 7.1 --- Results --- p.77 / Chapter 7.1.1 --- Importance-Performance (I-P) graph based on park managers' responses --- p.79 / Chapter 7.1.2 --- Importance-Performance (I-P) graph based on park users' responses --- p.81 / Chapter 7.2 --- Discussions --- p.82 / Chapter 7.2.1 --- Importance-Performance (I-P) Analyses of urban parks in Hong Kong --- p.82 / Chapter 7.2.2 --- Comparisons between responses of park managers and park users --- p.84 / Chapter 7.3 --- Recommendations --- p.85 / Chapter 7.3.1 --- Condition of urban parks in Hong Kong --- p.85 / Chapter 7.3.2 --- Resource allocation of urban parks --- p.86 / Chapter 7.3.3 --- Marketing methodology in public recreation management --- p.87 / Chapter 7.4 --- Summary --- p.88 / Chapter CHAPTER 8 --- CONCLUSION --- p.89 / Chapter 8.1 --- Summary of findings --- p.89 / Chapter 8.2 --- Implications of the study --- p.92 / Chapter 8.2.1 --- Indicator development and implementation in urban parks --- p.92 / Chapter 8.2.2 --- Multi-stakeholder approach in urban park management --- p.93 / Chapter 8.2.3 --- Adoption of marketing research methodology in recreation studies --- p.94 / Chapter 8.3 --- Limitations of the study --- p.94 / Chapter 8.4 --- Suggestions for future study --- p.96 / Bibliography --- p.99 / Appendices --- p.111