Across European cities local entrepreneurs are joining forces in new ways, forming collectives to stimulate business growth and innovation and to create a more attractive business environment. The value of such collectives is increasingly recognized by local governments and policy measures to stimulate these initiatives are being developed. Amsterdam hosts different collaborative initiatives, including 39 business improvement districts (BIDs).The Knowledge Mile is such a collective in which shopkeepers, other local SMEs, residents work together to collectively improve a large retail area. The city of Amsterdam is also a stakeholder. Government can fill an important role in enabling the creation of collective resource management in urban settings. However, if effective regulation is missing, citizens and governing bodies have to look for incentives to find new means of addressing governance. As such, the potential for collective management of urban commons may be greater than realized so far, as there is still a lack of knowledge in this area. In this paper, we aim to bridge this gap. By means of an embedded case study approach, we analyze the interaction between the stakeholders in their development of a green zone, the Knowledge Mile Park, in the Wibautstraat. In the coming years, roofs, facades and ground level will be changed through a collaboration of residents, entrepreneurs, researchers, civil servants and students in a metropolitan Living Lab. In this Living Lab, solutions for a healthy and social environment, climate resistance and biodiversity are jointly developed, tested and shown. In our study, we will analyze the role of the governing bodies in such initiatives, and make recommendations how collectives can become more mainstream with new kinds of institutions, without an undue burden on the community.
MULTIFILE
This book fills an important gap in the sport governance literature by engaging in critical reflection on the concept of ‘good governance’. It examines the theoretical perspectives that lead to different conceptualisations of governance and, therefore, to different standards for institutional quality. It explores the different practical strategies that have been employed to achieve the implementation of good governance principles. The first part of the book aims to shed light on the complexity and nuances of good governance by examining theoretical perspectives including leadership, value, feminism, culture and systems. The second part of the book has a practical focus, concentrating on reform strategies, from compliance policies and codes of ethics to external reporting and integrity systems. Together, these studies shed important new light on how we define and understand governance, and on the limits and capabilities of different methods for inducing good governance. With higher ethical standards demanded in sport business and management than ever before, this book is important reading for all advanced students and researchers with an interest in sport governance and sport policy, and for all sport industry professionals looking to improve their professional practice.
Collaborative learning is not a new teaching and learning approach; it has been around since the 1970s and is an evidence-based practice that has been proven to be effective time after time. Therefore, instead of reinventing the wheel or only relying on best practices or anecdotal evidence of what works and what doesn’t, especially when designing Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) environments, educators might find it useful to make use of existing collaborative learning instructional design elements. These elements have been scientifically proven to be effective and can be applied in both the physical and online international classroom.
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The denim industry faces many complex sustainability challenges and has been especially criticized for its polluting and hazardous production practices. Reducing resource use of water, chemicals and energy and changing denim production practices calls for collaboration between various stakeholders, including competing denim brands. There is great benefit in combining denim brands’ resources and knowledge so that commonly defined standards and benchmarks are developed and realized on a scale that matters. Collaboration however, and especially between competitors, is highly complex and prone to fail. This project brings leading denim brands together to collectively take initial steps towards improving the ecological sustainability impact of denim production, particularly by establishing measurements, benchmarks and standards for resource use (e.g. chemicals, water, energy) and creating best practices for effective collaboration. The central research question of our project is: How do denim brands effectively collaborate together to create common, industry standards on resource use and benchmarks for improved ecological sustainability in denim production? To answer this question, we will use a mixed-method, action research approach. The project’s research setting is the Amsterdam Metropolitan Area (MRA), which has a strong denim cluster and is home to many international denim brands and start-ups.
Dit onderzoek richt zich op de relatie tussen ‘collaborative foresight’, ‘anticipatory governance’ en stakeholderprocessen. Dit binnen de context van Sociaal Ecologische Systemen (SES) en met name Nationaal Park Alde Feanen, dat zich wil (door)ontwikkelen tot een zgn. 'Nationaal Park Nieuwe Stijl' in lijn met het recente nationale beleidsprogramma 'Nationale Parken 2024-2030'. Het overkoepelende doel van deze PD is: te identificeren hoe gezamenlijke foresight-praktijken effectief moeten worden ingericht en opgevolgd, zodat hiermee de governance van natuurtoeristische bestemmingen, zoals het Nationaal Park Alde Feanen, wordt versterkt. Hierbij rekening houdend met complexe multi-stakeholder processen waarin dit plaatsvindt. Deze PD sluit aan bij een aantal grote transitie vraagstukken waar landelijke gebieden in Nederland mee te maken hebben rondom natuur, water, landbouw, energie, wonen en het evenwichtig gebruik van schaars beschikbare ruimte. De opgaven vragen om een integrale en gezamenlijke aanpak naar de toekomst. Het Leisure, Tourism en Hospitality (LTH) domein kan hierin een sleutelrol spelen als overkoepelende drager voor ruimtelijke transities, zo ook binnen het ‘Nationaal Park Alde Feanen Nieuwe Stijl’. Door middel van een kwalitatieve onderzoeksaanpak zal deze PD de voorwaarden, belemmeringen en kansen identificeren om toekomstvisies om te zetten in collectieve actie richting de toekomst van het Nationaal Park. Ook wil deze PD een prototype ontwerp ontwikkelen voor een zgn. 'Anticipatory Futures Stakeholder Lab'. Een soort ‘infrastructuur’ gericht op continue en gezamenlijke anticiperende activiteiten, om opvolging en invulling te geven aan de trajecten naar de toekomst. De onderzoeksuitkomsten kunnen actoren in het LTH-domein ondersteunen in deze transitieprocessen, specifiek in het (omliggende) Alde Feanen gebied. Het sluit aan bij hun ambities om als voorbeeld te dienen voor andere Nederlandse nationale parken. Theoretisch wil het onderzoek bijdragen aan innovatie van bestaande foresight methoden en aan het huidige academische discours over hoe ‘Foresight’ en ‘Anticipation’ samenhangen met 'Good Governance' van sociaal-ecologische systemen.
Collaborative networks for sustainability are emerging rapidly to address urgent societal challenges. By bringing together organizations with different knowledge bases, resources and capabilities, collaborative networks enhance information exchange, knowledge sharing and learning opportunities to address these complex problems that cannot be solved by organizations individually. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the apparel sector, where examples of collaborative networks for sustainability are plenty, for example Sustainable Apparel Coalition, Zero Discharge Hazardous Chemicals, and the Fair Wear Foundation. Companies like C&A and H&M but also smaller players join these networks to take their social responsibility. Collaborative networks are unlike traditional forms of organizations; they are loosely structured collectives of different, often competing organizations, with dynamic membership and usually lack legal status. However, they do not emerge or organize on their own; they need network orchestrators who manage the network in terms of activities and participants. But network orchestrators face many challenges. They have to balance the interests of diverse companies and deal with tensions that often arise between them, like sharing their innovative knowledge. Orchestrators also have to “sell” the value of the network to potential new participants, who make decisions about which networks to join based on the benefits they expect to get from participating. Network orchestrators often do not know the best way to maintain engagement, commitment and enthusiasm or how to ensure knowledge and resource sharing, especially when competitors are involved. Furthermore, collaborative networks receive funding from grants or subsidies, creating financial uncertainty about its continuity. Raising financing from the private sector is difficult and network orchestrators compete more and more for resources. When networks dissolve or dysfunction (due to a lack of value creation and capture for participants, a lack of financing or a non-functioning business model), the collective value that has been created and accrued over time may be lost. This is problematic given that industrial transformations towards sustainability take many years and durable organizational forms are required to ensure ongoing support for this change. Network orchestration is a new profession. There are no guidelines, handbooks or good practices for how to perform this role, nor is there professional education or a professional association that represents network orchestrators. This is urgently needed as network orchestrators struggle with their role in governing networks so that they create and capture value for participants and ultimately ensure better network performance and survival. This project aims to foster the professionalization of the network orchestrator role by: (a) generating knowledge, developing and testing collaborative network governance models, facilitation tools and collaborative business modeling tools to enable network orchestrators to improve the performance of collaborative networks in terms of collective value creation (network level) and private value capture (network participant level) (b) organizing platform activities for network orchestrators to exchange ideas, best practices and learn from each other, thereby facilitating the formation of a professional identity, standards and community of network orchestrators.
