Finance for Sustainability - Call for papers

Daughters of Themis: International Network of Female Business Scholars is pleased to announce a call for papers for its fifth annual workshop on the theme of ‘Finance for sustainability’.

The aim of the annual workshop is to provide a forum for open, intimate and inspiring discussions about female business scholars’ common areas of interest. The network is open to all in the broad field of business including but not limited to disciplines of law, economics, accounting, organizational studies, political science, business, and sociology.

Call for papers deadline: 26 March 2019

Accommodation at Cavo Perlevos Studios, Kea, where the workshop is held. Photo: Cavos Perlevos Studio

Kea, Greece

From: 3rd June 2019 - To: 7th June 2019


Workshop theme

The contribution of financial markets and institutions is crucial to achieve sustainability at local and global levels. Sustainable Development has become a strategic objective for financial market actors. Since the launch of UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015, the global community has a common new framework for addressing the most urgent global problems. Together with the adoption of the Paris Climate Agreement and the Addis Ababa Agreement on Financing Sustainable Development in the same year, the SDGs have created a new impetus for a debate on channeling funding to sustainable projects and businesses.

While much attention has been on the financial risks of climate change, also as a driver for the EU’s Sustainable Finance Initiative, we define sustainability as securing the social foundation for humanity now and in the future while staying within planetary boundaries – and it is within this framework that we engage with the topic of finance for sustainability.

Sustainable finance emerges as a transdisciplinary approach that supports different perspectives in addressing sustainability issues from a financial perspective. The financial system has a key role to play, not only because a well-integrated financial system helps forward the smooth implementation of other economic policies and facilitates stability; but because any financial system should contribute, as should the rest of the economic system, to a more sustainable world. The contribution of the financial system, financial markets and financial products to sustainable development should be implemented within a holistic, multidisciplinary and integrative approach.

This workshop focuses on the issue of how the financial system can put sustainability at the heart of its institutions, policies, processes and products. The objective of this call for papers is to critically examine the financial system, the finance phenomena, financial institutions and intermediaries in a comprehensive approach, which understands that achieving the global goal of sustainability requires action local, regional and international action.

We are seeking contributions on the theme of ‘Finance for sustainability’, which may include proposals employing different approaches, including feminist perspectives, and analyse the relationship between finance phenomena and sustainable development, thereunder the sustainability contribution of regulatory requirements, assessment methodologies and new financial models (e.g. microfinance or fintech models).

Contributions may engage with one or several of the topics below, or other relevant issues:

  • Methodological challenges in researching sustainable finance
  • The role of women, gender and gender perspectives in finance for sustainability
  • Institutional investors, index funds and passive and active fund management
  • Finance and corporate governance of listed companies
  • The role of intermediaries in finance for sustainability
  • Financing bottom-up approaches to sustainable business
  • Sustainability impacts of financial products
  • Interaction between finance and other areas of law and policy
  • Finance for development within a sustainability framework
  • Governance mechanisms in financial institutions
  • International, regional and national regulatory and policy initiatives
  • Holistic approaches to sustainable finance assessment
  • Case studies of innovating financial solutions for sustainability, including disruptive financial products, microfinance, assessment methodologies, risks metrics, and sustainable clauses in financial contracts

Submission of abstract and selection of participants

The title of your paper and an abstract of 500 words should be submitted via this online form by 26 March 2019. Please note that extensions of the deadline are not possible this year.

Successful participants will be notified by 29 March 2019. The selection of participants will be competitive, based on the quality and thematic fit of the submitted abstract with the workshop theme. Timely submission of working papers is a condition for workshop participation.

Short working papers of a maximum of 2500 words including footnotes will be due by 15 May 2019. The word limit for the short working papers is chosen to enable all workshop  participants to read all papers in preparation for the workshop, and to give space for developing the themes of the individual papers after the workshop, based on the comments and discussion. The limit for the full-length papers will be 8,000 words including footnotes.

A peer-reviewed joint publication of the workshop papers is envisaged. We will therefore only accept original research, which is not submitted for publication elsewhere, and we request that the workshop participants commit to this publication process within a reasonable time line, to be agreed at the workshop.

Workshop spaces are limited to 14 participants so that each participant can benefit from extended discussion of her work. The workshop sessions are shaped to ensure interactive discussion, with two commentators per paper. Each participant will accordingly be asked to prepare comments for two other papers.

Practical details about the workshop

The workshop will be held on Tuesday 4 June to Friday 7 June 2019 at the Cavo Perlevos guesthouse on the Greek island of Kea, with self-contained studios with a bedroom, kitchen area and bathroom. Kea is reached by ferry from the port of Lavrio (near Athens) and there will be an informal welcome dinner on Monday 3 June in Lavrio for those staying overnight to catch the Tuesday morning ferry to Kea. A social programme will also be held on Saturday 8 June followed by a dinner in Athens that evening for those returning on Sunday 9 June.

The workshop programme is structured to allow for plenty of individual and collegiate social time with the optional social day on the Saturday.

Further details about travel and accommodation will be given to the selected participants.  We will set a reasonable self-cost workshop fee to cover accommodation at Cavo Perlevos and lunch and dinner from Tuesday through to Friday.

The network unfortunately has no general funding available for participants. However, we have managed to secure funds to contribute to costs for one or two participants. We wish to include female business scholars from lower-income countries in our network, and especially encourage submissions from existing or potential new members in such countries. Please provide a short justification in the financial hardship section of the online form, and let us know whether funding is a prerequisite for your attendance.

Organising committee for the 2019 workshop

Professor María Jesus Muñoz-Torres University Jaume I, Castellon

Professor Beate Sjåfjell, University of Oslo, Visiting Scholar at UC Berkeley

 

Published Mar. 8, 2019 1:00 PM - Last modified Sep. 2, 2022 8:43 AM