Environment and Society Studies - Corporate Sustainability and Rethinking Economies Radboud University

Overview

You will examine the private sector’s powerful influence on producing, delivering, and shaping products and services, and the resulting pressure this places on natural resources. Throughout the programme, you will explore innovative business models, organisational behaviour, and innovation management, alongside environmentally sustainable economic paths, such as the bio‑economy, circular economy, and sharing economy. You will also tackle the challenge of whether these models can thrive in markets driven by economic growth.

Future career opportunities

You will graduate with skills to analyse and design sustainability policy, foster collaboration among diverse stakeholders, and craft strategic plans and policy documents for environment‑and‑society challenges.  

Among others, you will have the ability to become:

• Environmental practitioner or consultant
• Sustainability advisor in businesses
• Policy-maker in a government setting

• Academic researcher or analyst

Research

A few examples to indicate the type of research in this specialisation:

• What is the role of innovative start-ups in changing the existing technologies and policies in the fashion industry or in the building sector, in order to make them more sustainable?
• How do businesses work on circularity? For example, do they emphasize the concept of refuse, reduce, reuse, repair, or recycle?
• How can new business models be developed while working on the bio-economy, the circular economy or the sharing economy?
• How can certification be helpful in increasing the responsibility of companies and their identification for the consumer?

Accreditation

This programme is accredited by the NVAO (the Dutch-Flemish accreditation organisation).