Resumo

Due to the growing visibility of sustainability in the media and in the governmental sphere, it is remarkable the increase of socio-environmental concern in the organizational scope. Thus, the relationship between sustainability and strategy has been highlighted in literature reviews composed by articles published in non-Brazilian international journals (e.g., Engert et al., 2016). In addition, some studies preach the need to integrate social and environmental issues into business strategy (e.g., Engert et al., 2016) as a way to maximize business effectiveness.

However, the focus of this integration can generate a misleading view of the relationship between these fields, demonstrating a hierarchical overlap that does not necessarily occur or should occur. Additionally, the non-consideration of articles published in Brazilian journals by previous reviews opens space for the investigation of contextual issues that may highlight new aspects of the subject. Thus, this article aimed to understand how the fields of strategy and sustainability have been related in scientific articles published in Brazilian management journals with high academic relevance.

It is emphasized that the concepts of sustainability and sustainable development are complementary, although distinct (Feil & Schreiber, 2017), the same as with sustainability and corporate social responsibility (Bansal & Desjardine, 2014). It is presented the conceptualization of strategy and how it relates to sustainability and, finally, a conceptual model for the relationship between sustainability and strategy is proposed, based on contextual influences and critical analysis of the relationship. This model was adopted as a scheme for conducting data analysis.

To achieve the proposed aim, an integrative literature review with a qualitative approach was conducted. The Brazilian management journals classified in the A2 stratum of Qualis ranking (CAPES Sucupira Platform) were considered of high academic relevance. Only general management journals were considered. Using these journals as a database were considered articles published since the emergence of each journal until 2019 - data search step. Twenty articles were analyzed. The thematic/categorical content analysis technique was adopted for the analysis of the selected articles.

From the results, a theoretical framework is proposed to analyze the relationship between sustainability and strategy consisting of nine issues: 1) Change process; 2) Specialized managers; 3) Strategic formulation process; 4) Strategic sustainability networks; 5) Social and environmental focus; 6) Application and evaluation tools; 7) Contextual influences; 8) Proactivity and reactivity; and 9) Critical analysis. These issues are interconnected in the activity process of organizations that relate sustainability and strategy.

While prior studies advocate the integration of sustainability into strategy, the results show that this integration is incompatible, and there should not be integration, but a relationship between sustainability and strategy, considering a critical analysis of this relationship. This critical perspective was identified in articles published in Brazil but were not emphasized in prior literature reviews. It was identified that the Brazilian articles do not differentiate the concepts of sustainability, sustainable development, and social responsibility, demonstrating a conceptual inconsistency.

Engert, S., et al. (2016). Exploring the integration of corporate sustainability into strategic management: a literature review. Journal of Cleaner Production, 112(2), 2833-2850. Feil, A. A., & Schreiber, D. (2017). Sustentabilidade e desenvolvimento sustentável: desvendando as sobreposições e alcances de seus significados. Cadernos EBAPE.BR, 14(3), 667-681. Bansal, P., & Desjardine, M. R. (2014). Business sustainability: It is about time. Strategic Organization, 12(1), 70-78.