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Transformative Business and Sustainability Transitions: A Framework and an Empirical Illustration

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Business Models for Sustainability Transitions

Abstract

New business models have been widely touted for their promise of sustainability. However, conceptual approaches to new business models largely fail to connect to sustainability transitions. In this contribution, we draw upon sustainability transitions research to introduce a transformative business model framework. Given the radically incremental nature of sustainability transitions, we propose that the radicalism and potential of new business models should be assessed in relation to their capacity to influence wider institutional settings and to the transition to which they belong. We report on an exploratory study of six transformative business cases in the context of the Dutch agri-food transition. Our results suggest that, in order to be transformative, businesses need to coevolve with specific wider institutional, discursive, practical and relational developments.

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Acknowledgements

This chapter is in part built on seven thesis projects at HAS University of Applied Sciences. We would like to thank Nigel Kennedy, Mark van Oijen, Thomas Pulles, Ruben Bots, Claire Wimmers, Matthé Wind, Koert van Bemmel, Sandra van der Maas, Katharina Grimm, Freek Braaksma, Talash Huijbers, Shanna de Groot, Joris van Lierop, Bart Millenaar, Sandra Kaiser, Janina Panning, Julia de Candido, Jocelyn van Reekum, Ana Maria Duursma, Razee Seyyed, Dominique Aarts, Elmar Adriaanssen, Aji Bajdan, Eveline Brouwers and Igor Gaina for all their empirical work and business model analyses.

The work presented here was made possible by a grant from the Netherlands Enterprise Agency to HAS University of Applied Science for the research chair in “New Business Models” and a grant from ACCEZ—Accelerating Circulair Economy Zuid-Holland—to the Dutch Research Institute for Transitions, for the project “A circular Green Heart.”

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. HAS University of Applied Sciences, ’s-Hertogenbosch, The Netherlands

    P. J. Beers, Marjo Baeten, Erwin Bouwmans, Bram van Helvoirt & Jos Wesselink

  2. Dutch Research Institute for Transitions, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

    P. J. Beers

  3. Kipster, Castenray, The Netherlands

    Ruud Zanders

Authors
  1. P. J. Beers
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  2. Marjo Baeten
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  3. Erwin Bouwmans
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  4. Bram van Helvoirt
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  5. Ruud Zanders
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Correspondence to P. J. Beers .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Business Development & Technology, Aarhus University, Herning, Denmark

    Annabeth Aagaard

  2. European Sustainability Department, ESCP Business School, Berlin, Germany

    Florian Lüdeke-Freund

  3. Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University, Cardiff, UK

    Peter Wells

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Beers, P.J., Baeten, M., Bouwmans, E., van Helvoirt, B., Wesselink, J., Zanders, R. (2021). Transformative Business and Sustainability Transitions: A Framework and an Empirical Illustration. In: Aagaard, A., Lüdeke-Freund, F., Wells, P. (eds) Business Models for Sustainability Transitions. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-77580-3_2

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