Onkila, T., Heikkinen, S., & Mäkelä, M. (2025). Sustainability Work With Tensions in Textile Companies: The Co-Construction of Organisational Narratives and Collective Agency. Organization and Environment. https://doi.org/10.1177/10860266251385501
Abstract
Sustainability work requires continuous reflection in a complex system of interconnected and competing demands. To shed light on the complexity and tensions of sustainability work in a controversial field, such as the textile industry, a narrative approach to sustainability work is utilised. The research data consist of individual interviews (21 participants) and four focus-group interviews (16 participants). The use of a narrative analysis reveals three prevailing organisational narratives that illustrate how sustainability work is constantly co-constructed through different organisational representatives and how they act in organisations: (1) the consolidating narrative of prestige, (2) the surrendering narrative of powerlessness and (3) the obscuring narrative of idealism. The study contributes to the extant literature by offering an understanding of sustainability work as consisting polyphonically and as constantly negotiated and evolving, and shows how narrative structures are constitutive of action in this field. It foregrounds the constitutive role of narrative structures, not merely as representational devices but as dynamic spaces through which organisational actors can generate and reduce enduring ambiguities and contradictions.
Reseachers
Further information and interviews: Tiina Onkila, Marileena Mäkelä
Professor (Corporate Environmental management) Tiina Onkila (tiina.onkila@jyu.fi) works in Jyväskylä University School of Business and Economics. Her research interests include sustainable business, circular economy, microlevel CSR, stakeholder approaches and sustainability reporting. She acts as the head of CEM-research group and is a member of Nature Panel Finland. In the BIODIDUL research project, Tiina coordinates work package 4 Biodiversity & Business.
Associate professor Marileena Mäkelä (marileena.t.makela@jyu.fi) works in Jyväskylä University School of Business and Economics Her research interests include sustainable communication, employees and sustainability, circular economy, biodiversity and business, and futures images. In the BIODIDUL research project, Marileena works in work package 4 Biodiversity & Business.
