AFAM Biennial Conference, 6th Biennial Conference - Cairo 2023

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Systems Perspectives on Business and Peace: The Contingent Nature of Firm Action with Respect to Peace Outcomes
Brian Ganson, Sarah Cechvala

Last modified: 2022-08-22

Abstract


Business and peace discourse addresses mechanisms of action by which a firm contributes to peace outcomes in fragile and conflict-prone environments. At the same time, scholarship has confronted the reality that a firm’s presence and operations can cause or exacerbate conflict, even when there is an explicit intention to have positive impact. Few works have addressed the general conditions that form the boundaries of these competing realities within a particular conflict context. We explore these boundary conditions of firm actions to affect peace outcomes through the modelling of small businesses in violent urban settings in South Africa. To do so, we apply tools of systems analysis that are well established in the peacebuilding field but are still largely unapplied in analyses of business, conflict, and peace. By developing systems archetypes that situate actions by, with, or for businesses within the broader landscape of dynamics enabling and inhibiting positive developments in the conflict system of which businesses are an integral part, we establish the contingent nature of business action in conflict environments. We thus add nuance to the scholarly discussion, with important implications for research, policy, and managerial decision making.


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