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Managing supply chains (SCs) for sustainability often results in conflicting demands, which can be conceptualized as sustainability tensions. This paper studies sustainability tensions in electronics SC contexts and the related management responses by applying a paradox perspective.

A single case study on the electronics SC is conducted with companies and third-party organizations as embedded units of analysis, using semi-structured interviews that are triangulated with publicly available data.

The study identifies tension elements (learning, belonging, organizing and economic performing) conflicting with general social–ecological objectives in the electronics SC. The results indicate a hierarchal structure among the sustainability tensions in SC contexts. The management responses of contextualization and resolution are assigned to the identified tensions.

Framing social–ecological objectives with their conflicting elements as paradoxical tensions enables organizations and SCs to develop better strategies for responding to complex sustainability issues in SC contexts.

The study contributes toward filling the gap on paradoxical sustainability tensions in SCs. Empirical insights are gained from different actors in the electronics SC. The level of emergence and interconnectedness of sustainability tensions in a larger SC context is explored through an outside-in perspective.

The purpose of this paper is to explore sustainability paradoxes in sharing economy initiatives by focusing on logistics management in last-mile logistics.

In this exploratory study, a total of 10 case studies were conducted in three categories of companies: anti-waste platforms, food delivery platforms and bicycle delivery companies. Twenty-seven face-to-face interviews with founders and/or managers and contractors (couriers, logistics service providers or volunteers) were the primary source of data collection. The heterogeneity of the sample enabled the authors to build an understanding of sustainability paradoxes in the logistics of sharing economy initiatives.

The findings indicate how logistics management impacts the sustainability of sharing economy initiatives in last-mile delivery. The authors identify seven paradoxical tensions (five of them social) generated by the contradictions between the organizations' promised environmental and social values and the impacts of their operations.

This exploratory research is based on a qualitative study of 10 cases and 27 interviews from heterogeneous samples; further empirical research is needed to ensure generalization.

The paper increases the understanding of environmental and social paradoxical tensions and awareness of logistics challenges.

The paper helps identify ways to reconcile promised values and impacts generated by sharing economy initiatives while managing last-mile delivery.

The results enrich the literature about the paradoxes in sharing economy initiatives by providing illustrations in last-mile logistics and exposing the underlying challenges for sharing economy logistics actors.

At the 2019 United Nations Climate Action Summit, the Club of Rome in collaboration with a network of global contributors issued a statement calling for nations to declare a planetary emergency. The statement calls for urgent action to prevent a global crisis due to the impact of human activity on the stability of the Earth’s life-support systems. Implications of the planetary emergency pose intriguing challenges for how managers address paradoxical sustainability challenges across spatial and temporal scales. In this chapter, the authors have two aims. First, the authors show that the planetary emergency is inherently paradoxical. To do this, the authors build an embedded view of the planetary emergency and argue that it is paradoxical due to key dynamics that emerge across organizational, economic, social, and environmental systems over time. Second, the authors advance paradox theory by exploring the paradoxical nature of the planetary emergency and propose a three-sequence framework for collective action including: (1) building a view of the planetary emergency across spatial and temporal scales, (2) collectively making sense of the planetary emergency, and (3) levering a paradoxical view of the planetary emergency to ensure effective action.

This study explores the potential of paradox theory as a novel theoretical lens to investigate persistent and interdependent tensions in supply chains. It is based on a critical literature review focusing on paradoxes observed within complex supply chains in dynamic business environments, including the articles selected for this special issue, “Environmental Dynamism and Supply Chain Complexity: Managing the Paradoxes.”

This study introduces the key concepts and themes of the paradox theory literature and possible methodological approaches to studying paradoxes in supply chains. Through a literature review, this study also reflects on the current state of paradox research in the field of operations and supply chain management (OSCM) and proposes future research questions.

The application of paradox theory to OSCM research is in its early stages. This paper presents opportunities to explore persistent and interdependent tensions in supply chains using paradox theory.

The paper suggests several new research questions that should be translated into more precise propositions. The main implication for research is a call to focus attention on how and why a paradox perspective can help supply chain researchers view complex supply chain problems with fresh eyes.

The study provides the first critical review of paradoxical tensions in OSCM research. While the papers in this special issue contribute significantly to a better understanding of these issues, there is still significant potential for understanding how to respond to paradoxes in supply chains.

Drawing on paradox theory and the category of the “performing-organizing” paradox, the study investigates the tensions firms experience in the context of organizing the processes involved in managing their indirect GHG emissions.

The authors develop hypotheses to explain why the paradox elements of supply chain transparency and supply chain coordination affect firms' ability to reduce their indirect supply chains GHG emissions. Using a two-stage method based on data from Refinitiv and CDP for 2002 to 2021, the authors test this study’s hypotheses through panel regression analyses.

While greater transparency experience with scope 3 emissions disclosure, GSCM practices and broader supply chain engagement are all associated with higher levels of scope 3 emissions levels, both long-term transparency experience and GSCM practices are also associated with relative reductions in scope 3 emissions over time.

Given growing pressures on firms to demonstrate both transparency and legitimacy regarding their scope 3 emissions, firms must understand the characteristics of this paradox as this has implications for how emissions performance is perceived and managed. This study's results suggested that firms need to take both a long-term perspective and effectively communicate the differences involved in reporting their emissions performance to avoid unwarranted criticism.

Filling a gap in sustainable OSCM studies by providing large-scale quantitative insights into the relationships between organizing and performing, the authors demonstrate that the processes involved in firms' efforts of measuring and managing their indirect scope 3 emissions are paradoxically affected by whether performance outcomes are specified as annual absolute levels of scope 3 emissions, or relative changes over time.

The traditional dualism view regards stability and change as opposites and separate, two essential but largely incompatible and mutually exclusive elements in an organization, and it advocates contingency theories to handle the paradox situation; more recent research has adopted the paradoxical lens to highlight both the contradiction and the interdependence between the two elements. This paper aims to address how an organization pursues stability and change simultaneously, i.e., how stability and change contradictorily enable each other to promote the development of an organization.

By adopting a case study on the strategic and structural change of Signcomplex in China, this paper attempts to explore the paradoxical relationship between stability and change, especially their interdependence. Multiple approaches were used during data collection to meet the criteria for trustworthiness, and the data analysis went through a five-step process. Through this analysis, the main mechanisms of stability and change were identified. An analysis was also conducted on how these stable and variable mechanisms enable each other, and finally, a framework was set up to show this paradoxical relationship.

The results confirm the paradox of stability and change: stability enables change by supplying security and consistency, offering reserved knowledge and skills and enabling commitment and the provision of resources for a better realization of the change. Change enables a firm to set up a new state of stability through variable mechanisms such as trial-and-error and exploration activities. The results also indicate that the nature of organizational change is to help an organization reach a new stable stage with higher efficiency and that organizational development relies on the paradoxical effects of both stability and change.

This research is constrained by several limitations. The findings need to be further confirmed through the investigation of more organizations; other stable mechanisms, such as habits, tight coupling, commitments, control and low variance, and variable mechanisms, such as search, mindfulness, redundancy and openness, should be considered. As an organization may experience many cross-level or cross-department changes which struggle with each other for resources and with stable mechanisms, to explore the paradox, future research may need to conduct a more in-depth examination of the system of change.

The findings offer some valuable insights for further research and hold important implications for management practices, especially management practices in a Chinese context. The findings extend the existing paradox theory by further revealing how stability and change enable each other and offer a paradoxical perspective to look into the nature of organizational change and organizational development. The results remind managers to rethink the relationship between stability and change, to factor these coexisting concepts into their decision-making and to accept, understand and use this paradoxical relationship to realize synergistic effects for the firm.

This study aims to investigate the approaches to and the actions of integrated thinking (IT) based on stakeholder engagement practices to mitigate the perception of IT as an “abstract construct” and to overcome the “silos” thinking of managing, communicating and reporting.

The research develops a single case-study of a leading Italian company in the sustainability setting: Lavazza. The authors gathered in-depth information with semi-structured interviews on their approaches to IT and actions of IT and the related stakeholder engagement practices which involved over time.

This study addresses the concept of IT, arguing for integrated circularity as a strategic mindset, which builds upon open communication and collaborative partnerships with stakeholders for value creation.

The limitations of this study stem from the nature of a single case study, thus the findings are most relevant to those companies operating in comparable sectors with similar historical and organizational characteristics.

The study provides a systematic framework of IT approaches and related actions based on stakeholder engagement practices that define a company as an integrated thinker. This can be used by managers and companies to implement an integrated logic of thinking and reporting.

This is a pioneering study in this area as there are very few ones that take into account the relationship between the IT of design and reporting from a stakeholder perspective. The more IT is embedded in the business, the fuller the consideration of key stakeholders’ interests is incorporated as a relevant part of conducting business.

The present study connects the literature on sustainable HRM with that on employability to investigate the relationship between sustainability-oriented human resource actions and organizational outcomes. More specifically, this study explores how training for employability affects the employer–employee relationship and employee retention. Furthermore, this study considers competitive intensity as a potential moderator in these relationships.

The analyses draw on the fourth European Company Survey (ECS 2019) with a sample of 21?869 firms with more than ten employees. Two separate logistic regression models were used to test the hypothesis.

The results show that training for employability contributes to improving the employer–employee relationship and that competitive intensity positively shapes this relationship. Contextually, training for employability reduces the overall employee retention of the firm.

Although this study supports the potential win–win nature of employability support, especially for companies that operate in competitive markets and an uncertain environment, it also highlights the existence of paradoxical sustainability tensions that should be managed by employers.

This chapter forwards a justification, an explanation, and numerous examples related to an emerging integrated sustainability management theory and its connections to other management theories and key-related concepts including systems and immersion. An integrated approach to sustainability solutions presents several implications for educators, researchers, practitioners, and policymakers, including the need to consider urgent and immediate responses that address sustainability crises at multiple levels and in multiple systems. This chapter is intended to promote reflection, dialogue, and a collective call to action to secure a sustainable world for present and future generations.

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused havoc on a global scale for supply chains, which put forward higher demand for organizations to reassess their global supply chain strategy and improve supply chain sustainability. The purpose of this paper is to understand how leader's paradoxical cognition affect supply chain sustainability.

This study conceptualizes a research model grounded in upper echelons theory and propose a chain-mediating model under the moderating effect of big data analytics. Using PLS-SEM method, we test the hypotheses using survey data collected from supply chain managers or leaders of the supply chain team from 193 firms.

The results indicate that supply chain ambidexterity and organizational learning play a mediating role in the relationship between leaders' paradoxical cognition on supply chain sustainability, respectively, and these two variables have a chain-mediating role in the relationship above. In addition, the big data analytics negatively moderates the relationship between leader's paradoxical cognition and organizational learning, and further moderates our chain mediating model.

This research initiatively focuses on the micro-foundations of supply chain sustainability from managerial cognition and firstly provides empirical evidence about the impact of leader's paradoxical cognition on supply chain sustainability.