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International trade and production have been increasingly organized around the configuration and evolution of global value chains (GVCs), even as the sustainable development goals (SDGs) have been established in an era of deepening globalization. The connection between these two processes raises some concerns around how economies, firms, and individuals can benefit from participation in the global economy. This chapter looks at the relationship between the relative positions of countries in high-tech GVCs and the impact on potential fulfillment of the SDGs. In this chapter, the authors make a first approach (descriptive analysis) to the relationship between the relative positions of countries in high-tech GVCs, possibilities for upgrading, and corresponding levels of inequality. The authors focus particularly on a set of indicators corresponding to Goal 1 (no poverty), Goal 5 (gender equality), Goal 9 (industry, innovation, and infrastructure), and Goal 10 (reduced inequalities). The findings reveal that the relationship between the position of a country in terms of forward and backward participations and the relative distance to fulfillment of the SDGs differs among distinct GVCs. While some patterns of income inequality reduction are observed in high-tech-related industries, gender inequality is not similarly affected. This confirms the relevance of building a two-dimensional framework that looks simultaneously at GVCs (i.e., the type of GVC and type of participation) as well as the distance from SDG achievement.

The concept of circular economy (CE) has been receiving a lot of attention over the past years from academics, practitioners and policymakers. This is particularly the case for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) who find in CE a way to overcome their resource scarcity. However, little is known about how embracing the CE perspective can contribute to meet the sustainable development goals (SDGs). The present chapter aims at answering this question. Through a single case study, we explore the drivers, managerial practices and collaborations implemented by SMEs to generate economic, social and environmental values.

In recent years, both academics and institutions have acknowledged the crucial role multinational enterprises (MNEs) can play in addressing the sustainability challenges, as formalized by the sustainable development goals (SDGs). Nevertheless, because of their extensiveness and their design as country-level targets, SDGs have proven challenging to operationalize at a firm level. This problem opens new and relevant avenues for research in international business (IB). This chapter attempts to frame the topic of extended value chain sustainability in the IB literature. In particular, it addresses a specific topic, that is, how sustainability and resilience-building practices interact in global value chains (GVCs). To do so, the present study develops the case of STMicroelectronics (ST), one of the biggest semiconductor companies worldwide.

As the size of the population is growing and the capacity of the planet Earth is limited, human beings are searching for sustainable and technology-enabled solutions to support society, ecology and economy. One of the solutions has been developing smart sustainable cities. Smart sustainable cities are cities as systems, where their infrastructure, different subsystems and different functional domains are virtually connected to the information and communication technologies (ICT) and internet via sensors and devices and the Internet of Things (IoT), to collect and process real-time Big Data and make efficient, effective and sustainable solutions for a democratic and liveable city for its various stakeholders. This chapter explores the concepts and practices of sustainable smart cities across the globe and explores the use of technologies such as IoT, Blockchain technology and Cloud computing, etc. their challenges and then presents a view on business models for sustainable smart cities.

Advanced education is often thought to respond to the demands of the economy, market forces create new occupations, and then universities respond with new degrees and curricula aimed at training future workers with specific new skills. Presented here is comparative research on an underappreciated, yet growing, concurrent alternative process: universities, with their global growth in numbers and enrollments, in concert with expanding research capacity, create and privilege knowledge and skills, legitimate new degrees that then become monetized and even required in private and public sectors of economies. A process referred to as academization of occupations has far-reaching implications for understanding the transformation of capitalism, new dimensions of social inequality, and resulting stratification among occupations. Academization is also eclipsing the more limited professionalization processes in occupations. Additionally, it fuels further expansion of advanced education and contributes to a new culture of work in the 21st century. Commissioned detailed German and US case studies of the university origins and influence on workplace consequences of seven selected occupations and associated knowledge, skills, and degrees investigate the academization process. And to demonstrate how universal this could become, the cases contrast the more open and less-restrictive education and occupation system in the US with the centralized and state-controlled education system in Germany. With expected variation, both economies and their occupational systems show evidence of robust academization. Importantly too is evidence of academic transformations of understandings about approaches to job tasks and use of authoritative knowledge in occupational activities.

This case study will illustrate how the Southern African Research and Innovation Management Association (SARIMA) set in motion a professionalisation journey through close collaboration with its members while leveraging strategic partnerships and funding opportunities. The case study will highlight the impetus that inspired the journey, and the outputs aimed at accelerating the professionalisation of research management and administration (RMA) beyond Southern Africa.