Theme 2. Sustainable Innovation, Design, Business and CSR - ERSCP-EMSU 2010 conference in Delft, the Netherlands

2A. Sustainable design, products & services
Sustainable products and services that are attractive to end-users are essential to moving towards sustainability. Different views on and approaches to design for sustainability have been developed (eco-efficiency, design for X, cradle-to-cradle, biomimicry, PSS) and translated into tools and methods. The development and testing of these (computer-aided) tools is an ongoing process that pays attention, not only at making existing products and/or services more sustainable, but also at how to translate potentially sustainable solutions (technologies and materials such as PV and bamboo) into successful designs. Besides the engineering side of sustainable design, contributions are invited that look at the human side, such as design for social sustainability and design for sustainable behaviour (e.g. persuasive technology)
2B. Sustainable entrepreneurship, business & Corporate Social Responsibility
The current financial crisis has shown that there is still a long way to go before CSR, sustainable entrepreneurship and sustainable business will have been sufficiently adopted in firms and entrenched in society. In this track, the aim is to look for contributions regarding the state-of-the-art in sustainability and 3P practices, methods and theories in CSR, entrepreneurship and business.
2C. Sustainable innovation in firms, networks and supply chains
Most sustainable innovations involve (networks of) firms. Such sustainable innovation practices need both to be embedded in the organisation and connected to a sustainable business model. The latter can be seen as an innovation in itself. This track seeks contributions on sustainable innovation practices in firms, networks and supply chains, and how this can be related to how firms combine technology, strategic orientation, and their links to consumers and customers. Submissions that combine conceptual development with empirical research have a strong preference.
2D. Knowledge collaboration and learning in sustainable innovation
To realize sustainable innovation, scientists and other stakeholders need to work together scientifically. The kind of transdisciplinary projects generally aim at, but not necessarily succeed in, realizing higher order learning. This track calls for theoretical, methodological and case-related contributions that can improve our understanding concerning issues that are related to knowledge collaboration, transdisciplinary research and learning. This includes looking at how to improve mutual knowledge exchange between academic institutions and professionals working on pilots in society, in particular with regard to improving how knowledge from these pilots and experiments is shared among relevant stakeholders and academic research.
2E. Sustainable innovation & design in developing countries
This tracks calls for contributions on sustainable innovation and design in developing countries, including Bottom-of the-Pyramid cases. It also looks for evaluations of current (sustainable) technology transfer practices, especially taking into consideration the cultural differences between the different contexts, North-South collaboration and how it can be improved and how a mutual learning process for development can take place
2F. Scenarios, backcasting and foresight
Sustainable development is very much about the future. However, regular forecasting and many scenario methods are not adequately equipped to cope with sustainable futures. This track invites contributions on foresight, scenarios and backcasting for sustainability and sustainable innovation. It includes accounts of studies, methodology development, and comparisons across cases, methods and countries. It also invites studies on the impact of foresight, scenarios and backcasting for sustainability, how this aspect can be studied and how the impact can be enhanced.