Detta är en kvalitativ studie där syftet var att bidra med kunskap kring hur icke-vinstdrivande organisationer konstruerar hållbarhetskommunikation, detta genom att undersöka hur Marine Stewardship Council [MSC] konstruerar sin hållbarhetskommunikation utifrån hållbarhetsdimensionerna: ekonomisk-, social- och ekologisk hållbarhet. Detta genom en riktad kvalitativ innehållsanalys av MSC:s externa kommunikation från deras hemsida och instagramkonto. Det teoretiska ramverk som applicerats på analysen är de tre hållbarhetsdimensionerna, vilka även utgör temana i analysen. Analysen har utförts utifrån ett kodschema där kategorier, underkategorier och koder har identifierats i materialet. Resultatet av analysen visade att MSC framställt sin kommunikation genom de tre hållbarhetsdimensionerna på flera olika sätt. Deras arbete kan också relateras till det teoretiska ramverket för denna studie. Dock konstateras det att det finns utrymme för vidare diskussion kring huruvida en mer allvarsam ton är en användbar strategi för MSC eller inte. Vidare visar resultatet att MSC beskriver flera av fiskeindustrins problem i relation till samtliga hållbarhetsdimensioner, dock hade kommunikationen upplevts mer trovärdig om en mer nyanserad bild av lösningar framställts.  Slutligen diskuteras resultatet i relation till tidigare forskning och därefter presenteras slutsats, reflektion samt förslag på vidare forskning. / This is a qualitative study with the purpose of contributing knowledge about how non-profit organizations construct sustainability communication. This has been done through analyzing how MSC construct their sustainability communication in relation to the following dimensions of sustainability: economic-, social-, and environmental sustainability. By doing a directed qualitative content analysis of MSC's external communication from their website and Instagram profile. The theoretical framework that has been applied to the analysis is the three sustainability dimensions, which also forms the themes of the analysis. The analysis was done using a coding scheme where categories, subcategories, and codes were identified in the material. The result of the analysis showed that the MSC portrays their communication through the three dimensions of sustainability in several ways. Additionally, their work is related to the theoretical framework of the study. However, there is room for further discussion on whether the MSC would benefit to use a more serious tone or not. Furthermore, the result shows that the MSC describes several problems that relates to the fishing industry. Although, their communication would be perceived as more believable if a more nuanced image of solutions were presented. Lastly, the result is discussed in relation to previous research followed by the conclusion, a reflection, and suggestions for future research.

This study investigates how Greenfluencers, a subgroup of social media influencers specializing in promoting sustainable lifestyles and raising environmental awareness among their followers, represent sustainability on Instagram. With the assumption of their influence going beyond the commercial sphere, potentially shaping public attitudes and behaviors toward sustainable development, Greenfluencers are considered relevant actors in sustainability communication. This research examines how sustainability is depicted through a qualitative content analysis of posts from ten German-speaking Greenfluencers during August 2023. Drawing on Raworth's "safe and just space for humanity" concept, the study evaluates the content of Greenfluencers' sustainability communication. Results revealed diverse portrayals of sustainability, focusing on environmental issues and individual responsibility. Greenfluencers often overlook the complexity of sustainability, the interconnectedness of social, economic, and environmental aspects, and the systemic causes of sustainability issues. Their content (partly) promotes ‘green’ consumerism through product recommendations and advertisements, overshadowing systemic solutions. Despite these limitations, Greenfluencers have the potential to serve as role models by promoting impactful, sustainable behaviors, such as adopting a plant-based diet. The exploratory nature of the study, its small sample size, and the limited timeframe of the content analysis limit the generalizability of the findings. The study highlights limitations within influencer-driven sustainability communication and underscores the importance of further investigation into the conditions under which social media influencers’ influence can promote sustainable development.

In recent years, sustainability has become more important for fast fashion companies to embrace. Partly because of climate change and partly because consumers’ demands are higher. To make a real difference, fast fashion companies need to communicate sustainability clearly, and consumers need to be receptive to this type of communication. Thereby, both fast fashion companies and consumers have responsibilities towards the environment. However, previous research shows that consumers lack comprehension of sustainability communication within the fast fashion industry. This leads to consumption of non-sustainable clothing items over sustainable clothing items. Based on the aforementioned, three main concepts were identified as pertinent to build upon, encompassing subconcepts. The main concepts are sustainability communication, consumer comprehension and purchasing decisions. The subconcepts are says what, to whom, motivation and engagement, word recognition, language comprehension, knowledge, intentions and action.  As previous research is scattered, this research is conducted to give a gathered understanding. The purpose of this research was to examine consumer comprehension of sustainability communication within the Swedish fast fashion industry. Additionally, considerable emphasis lay on purchasing decisions. To successfully do this, the primary data was collected through a pilot study and focus groups. More specifically, there were four focus groups with six participants in each.  The empirical findings, together with the literature review, concluded that consumers recognise environmental labels and designations but do not know what they stand for. Further, sustainability communication is placed in a positive category, despite lack of comprehension. The level of motivation and engagement is low, due to suspicions of greenwashing, among other things. Language comprehension was found to have no major impact on consumer comprehension of sustainability communication. Some felt that the communication should be concise and others felt that it should provide a broader perspective. Moreover, consumers notice the sustainability communication, however, they do not seek nor respond to it. These conclusions intend to create value for fast fashion companies.

This thesis examines how Boohoo, Shein, and Zara communicate their sustainability efforts on Instagram and how users react. Despite increased global awareness of sustainability, the fast fashion industry's rapid trend turnover, driven by social media and influencers, fuels consumption and environmental harm. Guided by theories of strategic communication, organizational legitimation, CSR communication, and transparency, the research used critical visual methods, including semiotic and qualitative text analysis. The analysis found that these companies use visual content to appear transparent, shift environmental responsibility onto individuals and the industry, make vague sustainability claims, and partner with influencers for legitimacy. User comments reveal concerns about worker treatment, skepticism towards sustainability efforts as greenwashing, and criticism of influencer partnerships. However, some users legitimize these practices, believing all businesses are equally culpable. The study concludes that while fashion companies recognize the risks they pose and attempt to address them, users are unimpressed by superficial efforts. The gap between companies' staged transparency and users' demand for real change highlights the need for genuine commitment to sustainability. Companies must be transparent and accountable to avoid greenwashing accusations and maintain consumer trust. This growing consumer awareness and empowerment suggest that critical examination by users and authentic sustainability efforts by companies are essential for future legitimacy.

Bakgrund: Klimatfrågan är ständigt aktuell och något som berör oss alla. Sverige har åtagit sig att genomföra Agenda 2030 och de 17 globala målen för hållbar utveckling men har i dagsläget svårigheter att uppfylla flertalet mål inom den utsatta tiden. Mål som Sveriges invånare många gånger har stor möjlighet att påverka. Kommuner är viktiga aktörer i genomförandet av Agenda 2030 då det många gånger är på lokal nivå som arbetet ska omsättas i praktiken. De anses ha ett stort ansvar vad gäller att främja hållbar utveckling i den egna verksamheten såväl som för kommunen som geografiskt område. Att förmå kommuninvånare att delta i hållbarhetsarbetet är därför viktigt.Syfte: Syftet med studien är att bidra med en ökad förståelse för hur svenska kommuner som har ett framgångsrikt miljöarbete använder hållbarhetsredovisning och hållbarhetssektion på hemsida för att engagera kommuninvånarna i arbetet med hållbar utveckling. Studien belyser hur fyra sådana kommuner väljer att utforma kommunikationen i syfte att engagera intressentgruppen invånare i organisationens hållbarhetsarbete genom dessa kanaler. Studien kan främst vara av intresse för kommuner som har för avsikt att engagera sina intressenter i hållbarhetsarbetet.Metod: Genom dokumentstudier undersöktes uppmaningar till engagemang riktade till invånare i de fyra deltagande kommunernas hållbarhetsredovisning samt hållbarhetssektion på hemsida. För att få förståelse för hur invånarna engageras har även intervjuer genomförts. Morsing och Schultz (2006) kommunikationsstrategier för hållbarhet har använts för att undersöka vilken strategi kommunerna tillämpar.Slutsats: Studien visar att när kommunerna uppmanar invånare att engagera sig i hållbarhetsarbetet handlar det i huvudsak om att informera snarare än att uppmana till respons- eller dialog. På hållbarhetssektionen informeras invånare om hur de själva kan bidra till en hållbar utveckling men studiens resultat indikerar att kommuner som önskar engagera invånare i hållbarhetsarbetet bör föra dialog med invånare i de kanaler som invånarna föredrar exempelvis sociala medier, då det skapar större engagemang. / Background: Climate change is something that affects us all and climate action is urgent. The Swedish government has committed to Agenda 2030 and the 17 goals for sustainable development (SDGs) but faces difficulties in achieving several of these goals in time. Municipalities are important in the implementation of the SDGs and its citizens have a great impact on the country's possibility to reach the SDGs. Municipalities answer for the sustainable development within their own organization as well as for the municipality as a geographical region. It is therefore important that the citizens are encouraged by itsmunicipality to engage in the work towards a sustainable development.Purpose: The purpose of this study is to contribute with further understanding of how Swedish municipalities with successful environmental work, use their sustainability report and sustainability section on their website to engage their citizens to participate in the municipalities work towards a sustainable development. The study can be of interest for municipalities that intend to engage their citizens in this work.Method: Content analysis of the sustainability reports and sustainability sections on the municipalities websites were conducted in order to study how these channels were used for different types of citizen engagement. Additionally, interviews have been conducted to gain a deeper understanding of how the municipalities in this study engage their citizens through these channels. Morsing and Schultz (2006) model of CSR communication strategies has been used as a framework to understand and describe which strategy the municipalities employ in these channels.Conclusion: When the municipalities encourage citizens to engage in the work towards a sustainable development, they primarily inform rather than ask citizens to provide feedback or engage in dialog. The municipalities use the sustainability section to inform citizens on how they can contribute to a sustainable development, however, the study indicates that municipalities who want to engage citizens trough two-way communication should focus on channels that citizens prefer, such as social media, as it creates more engagement.

The climate crisis is one of the biggest challenges humanity has ever faced, posing severe threats to people around the world. Increased awareness about this crisis as well as a growing call for a more sustainable world can be noted not only by scientists and activists but also in the political and economic sector as well as within religious communities. Making Ecocide - the destruction of the planet - an international crime could be a crucial step in tackling the climate crisis. Research has shown that communication is a powerful tool to create awareness and shape public opinion about sustainable development and the environment. Sustainability communication is a small but growing field in media and communication research (Weder et al. 2021: 2). However, research on audiences of sustainability communication, particularly on specific groups other than the general public, has been scarce.  This study analyzes spiritual and religious leaders’ perceptions of the Ecocide Law, their understanding of the mediated communication through the interreligious coalition ‘Faith for Ecocide Law’, and the influence of the communication on their attitudes and behavior towards the support of the law. For this purpose, semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with religious and spiritual leaders in Sweden. The results illustrate that the Ecocide Law is perceived as a powerful tool to fight environmental degradation and is highly supported by the religious leaders that were examined. Their support is motivated by worldviews, beliefs, values, and an understanding of nature as part of the holy creation, as well as humanity’s responsibility to protect it. Additional factors such as thorough pre-existing knowledge about environmental issues, sociodemographics, and a close relationship with nature influenced the perceptions and understanding of the communication. Furthermore, media technologies turned out to play only a small role as the informants, albeit frequent media consumers, became aware and supportive of the Ecocide Law through face-to-face communication with leading Ecocide Law activists. A thorough search of the existing academic literature indicates that this study is amongst the first to examine religious leaders’ perceptions of the Ecocide Law as well as the coalition Faith for Ecocide Law and of the communication on their digital platforms (LinkedIn, YouTube, Website) and emphasizes the need for sustainability communication to more specifically target key actors that can influence decision-making for sustainable development. Therefore, this study lays the ground for further research.

The purpose of this reception study is to increase the understanding of how perceptions correspond between communicators and recipients regarding which feeling is perceived to engage the most in the context of sustainability communication. The theoretical frame stretches from Sara Ahmed's theory about how actions are reactions of feelings, the green gap, living in denial, Tim Jensen’s theory about environmental guilt and theories in politics that include subactivism and Chantal Mouffe's theory about the importance of an “us and them” in opposition political movements. The study also includes theories within semiotic analysis, reception analysis and Stuart Hall's encoding/decoding model. The reception study is divided into two methods. The first method is a visual semiotic analysis that made it possible to find the preferred reading of the commercials. The second method is qualitative interviews which made it possible to analyse the way recipients interpret the message of the commercials. Analysing tools within reception analysis were applied to the material from the interviews with the recipients. The study also utilized a comparative analysis of interview responses between the communicators and recipients to locate possible differences in perceptions of sustainability communication.   The study's results show that positive emotions encourage recipients to maintain the already sustainable lifestyle they consider themselves to have but it also make them feel skeptical to the message. The negative emotions encourage them to make a behavior change but it also makes the recipients feel hopeless. The analysis however shows that the target group do not believe that they will make any further changes as they already believe that they are acting sustainably. The study has also identified some of the challenges that communicators face when it comes to sustainability communication. One is that the recipients respond best to the communication that they tend to avoid and another challenge is to find the balance between positive and negative emotions so that the recipient feels that the message is trustworthy. The study has also shown the importance of giving the recipients sustainable tools they feel they can act on. Dissonance between recipients and communicators regarding the sense of community has been located.

Fast fashion-industrin blir ständigt anklagad för att inte vara hållbar och konsumenters kunskap om hållbarhet är bristande. Forskning visar att konsumenternas förståelse för fast fashion-industrin och hur det påverkar omvärlden är nyckeln för att nå förändring och en hållbar industri. I och med att intresset för hållbarhet har ökat senaste åren och att engagemang är en viktig faktor för att skapa konkurrensfördelar för företag är syftet med arbetet att analysera svenska fast fashion-företags hållbarhetskommunikation på Instagram samt undersöka vilka faktorer som är viktiga för konsumentengagemang. Studien genomfördes med en kvalitativ innehållsanalys på Instagram med hjälp av en analysmodell som skapats baserad på tidigare forskning där hållbarhetskommunikation och konsumentengagemang kategoriserats utifrån olika faktorer.  Resultatet av studien visade att företagen kommunicerade hållbarhet i liten utsträckning men att när det väl kommunicerades gjordes på ett sätt som speglade respektive företags fokus. Hållbarhetskommunikationen på Instagram bestod i störst utsträckning av miljömässig och social hållbarhet där bilder var det mest använda formatet. Modefotografering, produktfoto, användargenererat innehåll och människor var motiven som kommunicerades mest. I företagens hållbarhetsinlägg kommunicerades hållbara affärspraxis, arbetet för beteendeförändring och insamlingar för att öka medvetenheten för hållbarhetsfrågor.  För aktivt konsumentengagemang konstateras att det är viktigt för fast fashion-företag att identifiera företagets målgrupp. Hållbarhetsinlägg som kommunicerades genom video genererade mer engagemang än bilder. Inlägg som illustrerade modefotografering och användargenererat innehåll engagerade konsumenter mest. Konsumenterna engagerades främst av känslomässigt laddade inlägg där företag ökade medvetenheten för hållbarhetsfrågor genom bland annat insamlingar till välgörenhet. Studien avslutas med en vägledning för svenska fast fashion-företag med en beskrivning av hur hållbarhet kan kommuniceras för att engagera konsumenter. / The fast fashion-industry is constantly accused of being unsustainable and consumers' knowledge of sustainability is lacking. Studies show that consumers' understanding of the fast fashion-industry and how it affects the outside world is the key to achieving change and a sustainable industry. With the interest in sustainability increasing in recent years and engagement being an important factor in creating competitive advantages for companies, the purpose of this study is to analyze Swedish fast-fashion companies' sustainability communication on Instagram and examine which factors are important for consumer engagement. The study was conducted through a qualitative content analysis on Instagram where a conceptual model, based on previous research, was used to categorize different factors of sustainability communication and consumer engagement. The results of the study showed that the companies communicated sustainability to a small extent, but when they did, it reflected the respective companies focuses. The sustainability communication on Instagram consisted mostly of environmental and social sustainability, where images were the most used format. Fashion photography, product photography, user-generated content and people were the most used factors by the companies. Sustainable business practices, social marketing and fundraising was used most frequently by the companies to raise awareness of sustainability issues. For consumers to be engaged, it is important for fast fashion-companies to identify their target group. Sustainability posts communicated through video generated more engagement than images. Posts that illustrated fashion photography and user-generated content engaged consumers the most. Consumers were especially engaged by emotional triggering posts where companies raised awareness of sustainability issues through fundraising. The study concludes by guidance for Swedish fast fashion-companies with a description of how sustainability can be communicated to engage consumers.

Companies have an important role to play in sustainability initiatives as they have great power to drive development. Working with sustainability issues can be seen as crucial to their survival, as various stakeholders today place high demands on companies to take responsibility in this area. This study aims to critically examine The Body Shop’s sustainability communication in order to gain a deeper understanding of how the company constructs a sustainable brand. The study is based on the following questions: (1) How does The Body Shop communicate sustainability? (2) Which discourses are most prominent in The Body Shop’s communication? (3) What does The Body Shop convey through its sustainability communication? The material consists of The Body Shop’s sustainability report, as it is an important part of a company’s sustainability communication. The study’s theoretical framework is based on theories of critical discourse theory, consumer society, brand identity and brand activism. Furthermore, the methodology of the study is multimodal critical discourse analysis, where we have used different analysis tools to study both visual and textual elements of the company’s sustainability report. To see how The Body Shop relates to the sustainability discourse and constructs a sustainable brand, different discursive themes were identified based on the roles the company takes in its communication. The two most prominent roles are the role of the fair company and the role of the innovative company, which further contribute to the maintenance of the sustainability discourse. The result shows that The Body Shop communicates in a transparent way, using informative and persuasive language which creates a sense of credibility. We can conclude that The Body Shop presents itself as a leader in the field and often as the solution to various societal problems. Finally, The Body Shop presents its sustainability communication as a goal rather than a means, as it appears that sustainable development is the company’s sole purpose.

Nachhaltigkeit als Leitidee bedingt einen Diskurs, mit dem Ziel eine Balance zwischen den Dimensionen Ökologie, Ökonomie, Soziales und Kultur (je nach herangezogenem Modell) herzustellen. Um die dazu not-wendigen nachhaltigen Aktivitäten, Ziele, Werte usw. umsetzen zu können ist ein fortlaufender Kommunikationsprozess erforderlich. Im Rahmen dieses Diskurses spielt Design eine bedeutende Rolle vor allem in Bezug auf das kommunikative Wirkziel: Glaubwürdigkeit schaffen. Ins-besondere in Systemen wie Unternehmen und Organisationen, denen eine Mitschuld an den Problemen der Erde und der Menschheit gegeben wird, ist die Kommunikation ihrer Verantwortung und damit verbundenen Aktivitäten für eine nachhaltige Entwicklung unerlässlich, um ihre Legitimität zu sichern. Die Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Kommunikation von Unternehmen und Organisationen manifestiert sich hauptsächlich in Form eines Rechenschaftsberichts (Nachhaltigkeitsbericht, CSR-Report) wobei dieser als gestaltetes Medium sowohl auf der textlichen als auch auf der visuellen Ebene argumentiert und mittels Glaubwürdigkeit das Vertrauen der Stakeholder und Leser gewinnen soll. Glaubwürdigkeit ist in Zeiten von Greenwashing und ‚Fake News‘ das wichtigste Qualitätskriterium auch für die visuelle Kommunikation.