Dear Colleagues,

In the last few decades, corporate sustainability has become a new corporate management paradigm. Consequently, the fundamental role of companies in sustainable development has been the subject of much academic research. Although, initially, this paradigm was studied and justified from a philosophical perspective, its instrumental dimension has become more relevant, especially since the end of the 1990s. From this instrumental dimension, also known as business case, corporate sustainability considers that traditional strategic objectives related to growth and profitability are clearly important, but in the same sense, companies should pursue societal goals, specifically those relating to sustainable development, currently included in the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Thus, understanding the relation between social and economic performance is essential toward getting corporations to engage with these goals, and in this way to develop corporate strategies that take this new paradigm into consideration.  Therefore, from academia and the corporate world, we need to develop new management and accounting tools that allow companies to monitor, account, and quantify risks, external factors, and income derived from such goals.  Although some beneficial innovations have been developed in recent years (carbon accounting, biodiversity management, water accounting and resource management, anti-corruption management, modern slavery, for example), substantial deficiencies still exist with regard to addressing planetary boundaries and broader societal goals.

Arising from this situation, the new EU Sustainable Development Strategy (EU SDS) aims to promote a new “Green Deal” in the EU economy. This Special Issue aims to attract potential authors to present their studies related to new, innovative approaches of sustainability accounting and management tools, which may help companies to identify their key problems in the context of the societal vision of sustainable development and to improve their contributions to the UNO goals. Works related to the following themes are most welcome: circular economy, sustainable supply chain management, planet boundaries, management and accounting tools, but this does not exclude other topics related to UN Sustainable Development Goals.

Prof. Igor Alvarez-Etxeberria
Guest Editor

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• corporate sustainability
• EMA
• social accounting
• circular economy
• water accounting/management
• carbon accounting/management
• sustainable supply chain