Cross-Sector Partnerships for Sustainability: How Mission-Driven Conveners Drive Change in National Coffee Platforms

Abstract

Nonprofit organizations (NPOs) have deployed various strategies in motivating businesses to source sustainably, such as the co-development and promotion of sustainability certification and direct collaboration in cross-sector partnerships (CSPs). This is an important current-day priority, given the ambitions set out in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and SDG 17 in particular. Increasingly, NPOs have taken up a role as conveners of such CSPs. Research on CSPs has, to date, often considered conveners as a ‘resource’ to the CSP, contributing to its effectiveness. In this study, we shift the focus towards the convener by considering a case of a ‘mission-driven convener’, an NPO that initiates CSPs as a strategy to realize its own sustainability objectives. Our explorative case study—comparing the NPO’s efforts across six countries in setting up national coffee platforms—reviews the concept of a mission-driven convener vis-à-vis established notions on convening and identifies which strategies it applies to realize a CSP. These strategies comprise productively combining certification-driven efforts with CSPs, combining process and outcomes of CSPs, and drawing on cross-level dynamics derived from outsourcing of convening work to local actors. With our study, we contribute to research on CSP conveners by offering an alternative interpretation to the relation between the CSP and the convener, attributing more agency to the convener as a mission-driven organization. Strengthening our understanding of CSPs and conveners is an important means to advance the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Perceptions of Multistakeholder Partnerships for the Sustainable Development Goals: A Case Study of Irish Non-State Actors

“…There is a considerable amount of research on what works and does not work in partnerships. One strand of research concentrates on the internal arrangements within a partnership that creates conditions for success, whereas other studies have investigated the external or socio-economic conditions under which partnerships operate that influence their success [9,24,27,33,34]. Other research has found that specific public policy issues can bring different relevant and interested stakeholders together [35].…”

“…Other research has discussed the power dynamics within partnership arrangements whereby more powerful stakeholders tend to exert too much control over processes [38]. Overall, while multistakeholder partnerships are very well suited to the concept of sustainability [34], the general trend in scholarship is to advise caution in assuming that partnerships are panaceas and that rigorous empirical research is required to explore the actual effectiveness of partnerships rather than adopting a normative understanding of the term [31,32].…”

Partnerships and Innovations Relevant to the Sustainable Development Goals

“…These third parties can either be individuals or agencies, and either work independently or within an organization. While there is no one defined formula, these actors are generally considered a "resource" to the partnership in the sense that their involvement enhances the likelihood of the cross sector partnership's success and are best utilized throughout the entire life cycle of the partnership (van Hille et al 2020).…”

“…Brokers play many roles including connector, ethical advisor, and motivator. The broker can also play an important role in calling out power imbalances and "plays a crucial bridging role in balancing different partners' interests in order to drive the cross sector partnership process forward throughout its implementation" (van Hille et al 2020). In the aforementioned example of the transdisciplinary project across cities, one of their learnings was that while implementation needed to be done according to city-based needs, they found that guidance from a national level would have been useful throughout the entire process.…”

“…They identified that this role would be useful to identify the technical and financial resources needed in each context, to facilitate horizontal learnings between regions and cities, to ensure consistency across approaches, to provide guidance on issues, and to build the capacity of local actors (Valencia et al 2019). Other studies exploring the value of partnership brokers in cross-sector partnerships find that the broker can support the collection and distribution of lessons learned, bring people together who have never done so before, and facilitating better coordination among participants (van Hille et al 2020). These skills are particularly useful for TI projects and approaches because of their alignment to TI's focus on learning and adaptivity.…”