Overview

Onna Malou van den Broek is a social scientist interested in the interplay between sustainability, nonmarket strategies, and (political) economy. Her work explores how transnational rules on corporate sustainability are formulated, diffused, and institutionalized, and how they ultimately become the bedrock for global governance. By conceptualizing the role of ideas in explaining the evolving dynamics between business, civil society and government actors, her research brings novel insights into the various socio-political strategies of corporate actors and offers new analytical tools to study institutions in a more iterative, agent-centred approach.

Prior to joining the University of Exeter Business School in 2022, Onna Malou van den Broek was a postdoctoral fellow at the Copenhagen Business School where she worked on the project “Regulating International Supply Chains”. She gained her PhD (funded by the ESRC) at King’s College London in the fields of sustainability and management and has been a visiting PhD fellow at the University of Amsterdam, University of North-Carolina, and Copenhagen Business School. She is the social media manager of the social issues in management (SIM) division at the Academy of Management Studies. Her work is published, amongst others, in Journal of Management Studies and Regulation & Governance.

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Research

Research interests

All of Onna Malou van den Broek’s research focusses on interactions between business, civil society and government actors, particularly in the field of corporate sustainability. Her research interests include:

- Corporate political activities, including lobbying

- Corporate sensemaking (and sense giving) of public policies

- Public policies on corporate sustainability

- Global policy diffusion 

- The role of ideas and languages in institutional change

- Sustainability intermediaries (like the UN Global Compact)

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External Engagement and Impact

Social Media Manager for the Social Issues in Management (SIM) division of the present Academy of Management.

Academic referee for Journal of Business Ethics, Business and Society, Academy of Management, and Regulation and Governance. 

Scientific affiliation:

• Member of European Group of Organization Studies

• Member of the International Association for Business and Society

• Member of the Academy of Management (SIM Division); 

• Member of the Alliance for Research on Corporate Sustainability; 

• Member of the European Consortium of Political Science (Divisions: Interest Groups and Regulatory Governance).

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Teaching

As lecturer Onna Malou van den Broek has taught and supervised business and political science students in the UK and the Netherlands. Her teaching emphasises the role of ideas and discourses in navigating heterogenous stakeholder interests in sustainability issues. List of courses/teaching experience:

- International Political Economy 

- Business Ethics and Sustainability

- Political Economy of Entrepreneurship

- Supply Chains and International Development

- Management in the Digital Age

Modules

2023/24

• BEP3040 - Local-Global Innovation (Cornwall Research Seminar Series)
• MBAM848 - The Politics of Sustainability

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