Sustainable Entrepreneurship

Sustainable Entrepreneurship stands for a business driven concept of sustainability which focusses on increasing both social as well as business value - so called Shared Value.

This book shows why and how this unique concept has the potential to become the most recognised strategic management approach in our times. It aims to point out the opportunities that arise from putting sustainable entrepreneurship into practice. At the same time, this book is a wake-up call for all those companies and decision makers who underestimated Sustainable Entrepreneurship before or who are simply not aware of its greater dimension. Well structured chapters from different academic and business perspectives clearly outline how Sustainable Entrepreneurship contributes to solving the world's most challenging problems, such as Climate Change, Finance Crisis and Political Uncertainty,  as well as to ensuring business success. The book provides a framework of orientation where the journey might go: What can a successful concept of SE look like? What are the key drivers for its realisation? What is the role of business in shaping the future of our society?

The book also presents best practices and provides unique learnings as well as business insights from the international Sustainable Entrepreneurship Award (www.se-award.org). The Sustainable Entrepreneurship Award (short SEA) is an award for companies today who are thinking about tomorrow by making sustainable business practices an integral part of their corporate culture. Companies that receive the SEA are being recognised for the vision they have shown in combining economic and sustainable responsibility.

In September 2009 Christina Weidinger founded diabla media Verlag, a Vienna-based publishing house where she is a managing partner. Diabla media Verlag is an international business publisher with a portfolio that includes business media for specific target groups, eg the European business magazine SUCCEED, Vienna City Guide, and Unternehmer, a business magazine for Austria's self-employed elite. Further, diabla media Verlag specialises in corporate publishing and produces high-quality magazines such as Skylines, Qatar and special issues of SUCCEED. In December 2011 Weidinger founded the Sustainable Entrepreneurship Award (SEA). The SEA aims to achieve a synergy of politics, industry and society on the topic of sustainability. It showcases companies who are making important contributions to Sustainable Entrepreneurship.The actions of Sustainable Entrepreneurs and organisations are just as future oriented as the core principle of sustainability. This is why the SEA is endorsed by renowned experts and organizations.   

Dr. René Schmidpeter is the academic head of the Centre for Humane Market Economy ('Zentrum für humane Marktwirtschaft') in Salzburg, member of the Club of Rome (Austrian Chapter) and member of the Jury for the Sustainable Entrepreneurship Award (SEA). He teaches CSR and Sustainability at several business schools and universities in Europe. He studied business administration, applied European studies, social ethics and social politics in Germany, Great Britain and the USA. For more than ten years he has worked and done research in the field of corporate social responsibility and sustainability. He is Section Editor of the CSR Encyclopaedia and Editor of several publications on Corporate Social Responsibility with Springer: e.g. 'Social Innovation' (2013), 'Corporate Social Responsibility - Verantwortungsvolle Unternehmensführung in Theorie und Praxis' (2012); 'Handbuch Corporate Citizenship' (2008) and 'CSR across Europe' (2005).