Sear SIM community,
The so-called blue economy, an economy connected to our oceans, represents the 7th largest economy in the world. Despite the critical role played by the world's oceans, management scholarship (and business-society scholarship) has engaged with oceanic contexts in a relatively limited and uneven way. The aim of this Business & Society Special Issue is to encourage cross-disciplinary research that examines oceans as a business–society nexus. It focuses on how blue economy activities interact with governance arrangements and social justice considerations, and how such interactions shape the economic, social, and ecological dimensions of ocean use.
We welcome contributions that examine business–society relations in contexts related to oceans and coastal environments. Submissions may be empirical, conceptual, or review-based, including case studies at country, sectoral, or firm level, provided they move beyond description to generate broader insights into business–society dynamics in these settings.
We particularly welcome work that takes ocean- and coast-related phenomena as its starting point and reflects on how insights from these contexts inform existing debates in business-society research and beyond. Research involving human participants should be conducted with appropriate sensitivity to local contexts and research practices, including culturally appropriate methods and meaningful engagement with local communities.
Indigenous-centered submissions should reflect "relational ontologies; worldviews in which relationships among humans, non-humans, ancestors, and the land are constitutive of identity" (Doshi et al., 2026, forthcoming in Business & Society). Authors conducting indigenous-centered research should follow the proposed checklist by Doshi and colleagues (Table 3) in Business & Society, which provides guidance related to topic, context, methods, theoretical lenses and style of writing. Such research should first and foremost honor indigenous ways of knowing and being, including as it relates to the blue economy. It should also empower collective indigenous agency, benefit indigenous communities and advance indigenous rights.
Guest Editors
- Matevž (Matt) Rašković, Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand
- Noemi Sinkovics, Newcastle University, United Kingdom
- Michelle Voyer, University of Wollongong, Australia
- Nives Dolšak, University of Washington, USA
- Gurmeet Singh, University of the South Pacific, Fiji
Business & Society Editor
- Céline Louche, University of Waikato, New Zealand
Contact Details
Indicative timelines (incl. conferences and workshops)
- Online idea generation workshop: May-June 2026
- Online research capacity building workshop for PhD students, early-career scholars and emerging market scholars: August 2026
- One-month submission window for full papers: 15 March to 15 May 2027
- Hybrid PDW for R&R papers at the University of the South Pacific in Fiji: June 2027
- Online "Delphi method" workshop for writing a scene-setting future research agenda as a part of the Introduction to the Special Issue: November 2027
More information: https://journals.sagepub.com/pb-assets/cmscontent/BAS/2026-BS-Blue%20Economy-Revised-23Feb2026_final-1771866037403.pdf
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Céline Louche
celine.louche@waikato.ac.nz------------------------------