The strategies of ordinary companies in the face of major challenges: from alternative imaginaries to real utopias

Thesis defended on the 10th of December 2021 at 2:00 pm and it hold by videoconference

Abstract :

As International organizations have been alerting governments and civil society to the collapse of the Earth's ecosystems for several decades. Facing such a situation, even small companies are experimenting with novel and unconventional solutions to the societal challenges of our time. What are the implications of theses these solutions at the strategic and organizational levels? This doctoral work is based on a long immersion in Ulterïa, a group of companies involved in the transformation of the food and non-food distribution sector. Ulterïa develops ecological distribution systems without packaging, promoting bulk merchandising. Using a comprehensive approach, this case study aims to show how a small and modest group integrates major societal challenges into its strategy and organization. This thesis mobilizes recent literature on grand challenge management and specifically discusses the relevance of the robust action theoretical model for thinking about strategies addressing societal challenges (Etzion et al., 2017; Ferraro et al., 2015). To complement this theoretical approach, we add to our thinking recent work on the role of the imaginary and real utopia in collective action (Wright et al., 2017; Gümüsay & Reinecke, 2021), arguing that these two components play a decisive role in managing societal problems. Three main findings emerge from this thesis. First, we characterize the specificity of the concept of grand challenges in relation to conceptually related notions (meta-problem, wicked problem, mess) and develop in detail how the contribution to societal challenges crystallizes at several levels of analysis, individual, organizational and sectoral. Second, we observe that the contribution to a major societal challenge is structured around alternative imaginaries of the organization and management that significantly influence the organization's design, strategy and development. Third, we revisit the theoretical model of robust action to explain the strategic process of modest and ordinary firms aiming to contribute to societal challenges. In order to make their contributions, the firms constitute themselves as real utopias via a process that articulates experiments carried out locally and multiple alternative imaginaries. This process is based on the superimposition of a space of local issues and a space of global issues. This work of putting in resonance between local and global then requires an organization functioning through three main items: a more or less centralized participatory architecture, the multivocity of discourses facilitating the penetration of multiple imaginaries within it, and numerous local experiments mixing diverse activities of an economic, social, environmental, educational, or philanthropic nature, and attesting to the organization's ability to tackle societal issues

Composition du jury :

Keywords :

grand challenge, robust action, strategic process, imaginary, real utopia