Contenu du sommaire : Mettre en œuvre et évaluer les stratégies « développement durable »

The purpose of this paper is to ‘conceive' the organization, either it is a question of perceiving it as an ‘object' (organization) or as a process (organizing), using concepts related to sexuality, with an assumed partiality. It is not a question to make of this working hypothesis a ‘sufficient' hypothesis, which would allow to understand everything. But it is here question to use a hypothesis, which allows to ‘try' other aspects than those that are currently used in Organization Science. With this attempt, we will also try to avoid to stay on a metaphoric level, level which would consist of playing with words. The attempts made here have the ambition of going beyond a metaphoric use of concepts related to sexuality. After having briefly presented what is meant when we speak of an organizational model, the conceptual operator of this modelling process will be presented (the comprehensive trilogy ‘ambiguity, ambivalence, exhibition') before being able to formulate the outlines of a sadomasochistic model of the organization.

According to a traditional design, the organization is considered as a unit having a set of devices able to ensure its finality and to carry out its objectives. This design is based on the coincidence of the interests of its various actors and on their “alleviated” interaction. Thus, an offensive and aggressive dimension is not sufficiently considered in the study of the actor-organization relationship. In this paper, we propose to highlight this “polemical” dimension by making recourse to the concepts of Eros and Polemos. Indeed, several researchers have highlighted the presence of symbols and myths in the being of the organization. We will show the existence of forms of oxymore and/or of causality of erotic and polemical dimensions in the actor-organization relationship and we will discuss their representations. A systemic approach will put, finally, the light on the foundation explaining the coexistence of this couple and the role of a “wise fire” in the life of an organization.

This paper analyzes the behaviors of actors of several industries joining or leaving coalitions developed in the case of the business ecosystems of video formats. Our research relies on a cross-referenced analysis of the literature of standards with secondary data from Internet sites. The analysis shows that the nature and intensity of the links between firms have an impact on the success of a coalition and can lead firms to leave one coalition for another one.

From its early times, management science has always sought ways to implement the erotic principle of goal congruence. In the same time, contradictory Reason seems not to belong to the “natural” environment of managers. This is all the more regrettable that contradiction casts a profitable light onto organizational dynamics. This article introduces a case in which both contradiction and congruence based frameworks need to be developed to fully understand how a specific practice – induction in a consulting company – has remained compliant to the same standards for years, whereas the main context and “practices” have changed many times elsewhere. The method for research is based on the hypothesis that a practice can be depicted as a set of interactions between ostensive (action scripts), performative (actions) aspects and artefacts (material outcomes).It appears that these constant interactions, instead of leading to constant change and adaptation, contribute to maintain the studied practice in a - quite surprisingly – permanent state. Such interactions can be identified as institutionalizing dynamics. The research results lead to circumscribe three major components of the observed institutionalization process. The first one is – unsurprisingly – repetition (through observation or prescription). The second one consists in the conjunction of authority and seniority. Finally, the polemic coexistence of rational action scripts and actual traditional actions leads to the change of a simple practice into an institution.

Law procedure is a node of connecting and disconnecting as well inter as intra firms. As a procedure, mediation between a before and an after, it belongs to the Eros. Being judicial it belongs to the Polemos, in so far as justice's role consists in untangling affairs from a nexus of suppositions, proofs, grievances and damages. We examine here the case of actions that are brought by a firm against another one due to information system affairs, during which as well internal as external, technical as emotional, judicial as organizational stakes contribute to shape what happens. A five years long action-research conducted in the field forms the basis empirical basis of this work, that leads us to interpret actions through Greimas' narrative grammar.

The goal of the proposed analysis is to understand the diffusion mode of the concept of sustainable development in a homogenous social group (the economic actors), from a neo-institutional theoretical approach. This analysis is based on the study of official documents of most of the main economic institutions whose object is to diffuse and to incite the application of the sustainable development among companies. The links between macro level (international institutions such as OECD) and micro level (companies) are also underlined.

Managers use up more and more in their discourses and in their communication strategies the term of sustainable development. This term become now more popular than the related term of social responsibility. Public opinion, media and Non Governmental Organizations pressures reinforce this phenomenon. Although popular, SD is fundamentally an ethical concept. It must be introduced carefully when it's translated to the business world. This paper describes critical challenges encountered when SD is integrated at a corporate level. Using different points of view, we identify spatial, dimensional and temporal pitfalls as the firm defines its societal political boundaries and decision making points. We present different points of view to explain these pitfalls; it enables us to discover distortions from the primary sustainable development ethics.

The general competitive society seriously threatens sustainable development. The objectives of sustainable development in a competitive society are conflicting. These conflicting objectives present management with a serious challenge and will only be overcome by initiating and inciting the development of a new system. It is possible to find the premises of this in Illich's theory. A socially interactive culture is the key for fair national governance and management in the commercial arena. The resolution of conflicting objectives will lift us into a new dimension of well-balanced and sustainable development of societies benefiting the world as a whole.

This article examines the theoretical basis of ethics and corporate social responsibility of Fair Trade Organizations. It shows that the ethics of the social economy brought by the pioneers associations would face the business ethics mobilized by the commercial firms and concludes that this moralist approach would include limits in the building of a socially responsible management.

It is patent that the choice of a methodology process is highly noteworthy in doctoral studies or scholarly papers. However, its foundation stems up from the corroboration of considerable research material. It is all the more valid when trans-disciplinary issues are tackled, such as the one of environmental risks. The production of significant amount of data coupled with the absence of censorship on information sources (books, reviews) are to be taken as an opportunity compared with other methods where strict selection is enhanced.

This article presents a four-phase methodology to optimize the implementation of an environmental strategy within a company. First, the methodology identifies the strategic direction of the company, including the financial and economic impact of the strategy. Second, it defines a coherent strategy with using the SD 21 000 logic. Third, it marshals support from the employees for implementing the strategy using an orderly and specific methodology that encapsulates the entire organization. Fourth, it opens the process to monitoring the implementation to the value of the environmental strategy. This provides a methodology consistent with the logic of “continuous improvement.”

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) still remains forgotten in the world of French Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SMEs). Among the social topics of the CSR, the one of diversity arrives at the head of the leaders' and managers' concerns, especially in large companies. Is this collective awakening a sign of a revival of managerial practices or a marketing argument for companies in search of legitimacy? In other words, can diversity management be regarded as a managerial philosophy dedicated to performance? This article aims at investigating these questions through the case study of a small company located in Northern France.

The energy crisis has an immediate effect over the price of the fuel and a destructive effect on the airline companies. The notion of performance in the aircraft industry joins in the innovation, the lifecycle of an aircraft, the differentiation and the control of the costs. The economic and financial crisis leads the manufacturers and the Tier 1 suppliers (e.g Snecma division of the Safran Group) to reduce the consumption and respect the environmental constraints. In 2001,The Advisory Council for Aeronautics Research in Europe (ACARE) put forward a vision for the European Aerospace industry and targets with an environmental focus include a 50% reduction in CO2, a 50% reduction in perceived noise and an 80% reduction in NOx by 2020 relative to year-2000 aircraft. How does Tier 1 suppliers have to integrate these new constraints relative to the energy, environment and consumption of aircrafts? Is the innovation produce a comparative advantage ? Is the anticipation a tool of performance for the « sustainable development » ? This paper proposes a diagnosis of the criteria of traditional performances, the evolutions and the hypotheses to build a new model of performance for the Tier 1 suppliers.

This research aims at defining representations of oyster farmers about sustainable development, as a “green” evolution of practices appears as an obligation. Acception of sustainable development, stakes and role of stakeholders are discussed. Representations of oyster farmers are empirically tested. Resultas are analysed. This research takes place in the beginning of an operational process leading to an evolution of practices. Therefore, following steps of the process are presented.

This article presents a cluster analysis of French consumers based on sustainable tourism. Analyses, led on a sample of 545 individuals, show the existence of 5 tourists' profiles, among which two are considered as sustainable and 3 as non sustainable. The description of the obtained profiles shows that individuals sensitive to sustainable tourism also have a socially responsible consumption.

This communication focuses on the creation process of a management control system to assess the economic, environmental and social performance of a public organization. Starting from an action-research led in a French government during a period of one year, this research explores the human issues of the CSR instrumentation. The results indicate the importance of the dialectic actors / tool during the creation process: the actors' representations influence the management control system and these representations are influenced by the form of the management device. However, beyond theses differing views, it appears that the difficulties of creating this instrumentation are directly related to distinctive ways of apprehending the CSR concept.

Environmental performance is a current topic for researchers in management science. Since the NRE Law, it is one of the major concerns of business managers. To assess this performance, more and more firms adopt some managerial tools recommended by ISO 14000 standards, such as audits and environmental indicators. It is advisable to consider the role of these tools in firms: do they respond to real organizational needs ? Or are they used to promote the corporate image at the hands of strong institutional pressures ? This article attempts to answer these questions by mobilizing the neo-institutional theory through a case study conducted in ten French firms certified ISO 14001.

Using a Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) for panel data, this study investigates the influence of corporate social responsibility (CSR) on financial performance, for 214 European firms between 2000 and 2005. The CSR index reveals whether or not the firm published a social report for year t. Statistical evidence shows that this index is negatively and significantly associated with the expected return on the capital asset, even after (i) controlling for size, sector and country specific effect or PER, and (ii) correcting for size-CSR multicolinearity bias.