The Role of Institutional Context for Sustainability Cross-Sector Partnerships. An Exploratory Analysis of European Cities

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

please, refer to the attached file

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

August 16^th, 2021

Dear Reviewer,

I hope this revision finds you well.

Thank you very much for your positive comments and suggestions for revisions. I believe that this version will satisfy your requests. Below you can find my responses to each request.

Best regards,

Eduardo Ordonez-Ponce, PhD

Athabasca University

 

Reviewer:

Two cities, Barcelona and Bristol, were selected for analysis. The reasons for choosing the two cities in this study should be presented more objectively. This study is an exploratory study and qualitative study, so it is difficult to present the reason for sample selection as clearly as a quantitative study. Nevertheless, it is necessary to supplement the reasons for selecting two cities from among the numerous global cities.

• Response: Thanks for this suggestion. As seen from section 3.1, I have explained in detail how these two cities were selected.

The researcher mentions that six open questions are used. It is necessary to present how those questions were formed because, in qualitative research, the form and structure of the question itself is an important research tool. In addition, it is necessary to specify who participated in the interview and the characteristics of the interviewee. Since stakeholders from various sectors are involved, it is important who participates in the interview in the case study.

• Response: As it can be seen in section 3.2, the first three questions around local, national and international institutional contexts were formed based on the literature about diverse contexts and the diversity of partnering organizations (2.1). Furthermore, three more questions were added with the aim of contributing to make the most from the contexts helping partnerships and to manage those playing against their development. As explained, literature shows that although partnerships have increased in numbers and are recognised as key to address sustainability challenges and achieve sustainable development, they are not perfect so the institutional elements of context enabling and inhibiting their development were added to contribute to their progress. Finally, we asked about their learning experiences with the purpose of contributing to the sustainable cities movement. I have also provided additional information about the leaders of the studied partnerships. However, I cannot share their identities.

The interview results are organized into six items. Although the previous three institutional contexts are dealt with perspective of Scott in the theoretical background, additional explanations are also needed how enablers, the elements to be revised, and learnings and relationships were derived.

• Response: Enablers, inhibitors and learnings were directly asked to the interviewees. I have presented these findings more clearly now explaining that these came from the interviewees

The last three analysis results are also related to the research question, it may appear that the interview was conducted after determining the research result in advance rather than finding the research result through an interview analysis. The distinction between enablers and elements can also seem like a rather arbitrary interpretation, so it is better to reconstruct it from a more theoretical level.

• Response: I am not sure I understand what you mean correctly. I have revised the text in detail and I do not see how it could be interpreted as if the interviews were conducted after determining the results. I have made some changes to the text now that I hope will clarify that the results are based on the interviews findings and that the research was properly conducted.

In this regard, if possible, I would like to recommend that you consider modifying the enablers and elements in a way that separates them into local, national, and international contexts.

• Response: Thanks for this suggestion. However, the data as it was collected do not allow me to make these distinctions. I have added explanatory sentences in both sections.

In conclusion, what the researcher wants to propose through the analysis should be specified more. Although we agree that local culture and norms play an important role, further explanation is needed on the role of national and international contexts that is considered to be play an important role, and whether not the importance of local culture and norms is derived from that this study is at the regional level.

• Response: Thanks for this. I have expanded the discussion covering what you have suggested.

Reviewer 2 Report

Thank you for the opportunity to review this study titled, The Role of Institutional Context for Sustainability Cross-Sector Partnerships. An Exploratory Analysis of European Cities, which identifies an innovative perspective/method about the sustainable cities and partnerships strategy. The literature review/description is not well informed. In my opinion the literature review should also insert topics such as sustainability in cities (see for example, Rodrigues & Franco).

In my opinion this paper focuses an interesting topic in area, but overall, the paper offers not an interesting overview for these topics here studied. Sustainability and creative cities topics should be inserted.

The Method section should be supported with citations and more methodological procedures could be inserted. For example, case studies criteria of selection, data collection, data analysis. Also the protocol used (see Yin, 2015) should be inserted. In this section, the authors could more clearly to show the methodological procedures used. This methodology section is weak. It should be extended and reinforced.

 

In Results section there is certain important points but the arguments are unconvincing. A more discussion about the empirical evidences is necessary.

Overall, the manuscript makes some interesting points, but more innovative contributions should be given on theoretical and practical implications. Contributions for this research area and contingency theory should be reinforced. The conclusions and implications could be extended, innovative and more contributions should also be presented for this study context and an innovative framework should be proposed.

Author Response

August 16^th, 2021

Dear Editor(s)

I hope this revision finds you well.

Thank you very much for your positive comments and suggestions for revisions. I believe that this version will satisfy your requests as well as those from the referees. Below you can find my responses to each request and the reviewed manuscript is attached for your revision.

Best regards,

Eduardo Ordonez-Ponce, PhD

Athabasca University

 

Reviewer 1:

Two cities, Barcelona and Bristol, were selected for analysis. The reasons for choosing the two cities in this study should be presented more objectively. This study is an exploratory study and qualitative study, so it is difficult to present the reason for sample selection as clearly as a quantitative study. Nevertheless, it is necessary to supplement the reasons for selecting two cities from among the numerous global cities.

• Response: Thanks for this suggestion. As seen from section 3.1, I have explained in detail how these two cities were selected.

The researcher mentions that six open questions are used. It is necessary to present how those questions were formed because, in qualitative research, the form and structure of the question itself is an important research tool. In addition, it is necessary to specify who participated in the interview and the characteristics of the interviewee. Since stakeholders from various sectors are involved, it is important who participates in the interview in the case study.

• Response: As it can be seen in section 3.2, the first three questions around local, national and international institutional contexts were formed based on the literature about diverse contexts and the diversity of partnering organizations (2.1). Furthermore, three more questions were added with the aim of contributing to make the most from the contexts helping partnerships and to manage those playing against their development. As explained, literature shows that although partnerships have increased in numbers and are recognised as key to address sustainability challenges and achieve sustainable development, they are not perfect so the institutional elements of context enabling and inhibiting their development were added to contribute to their progress. Finally, we asked about their learning experiences with the purpose of contributing to the sustainable cities movement. I have also provided additional information about the leaders of the studied partnerships. However, I cannot share their identities.

The interview results are organized into six items. Although the previous three institutional contexts are dealt with perspective of Scott in the theoretical background, additional explanations are also needed how enablers, the elements to be revised, and learnings and relationships were derived.

• Response: Enablers, inhibitors and learnings were directly asked to the interviewees. I have presented these findings more clearly now explaining that these came from the interviewees

The last three analysis results are also related to the research question, it may appear that the interview was conducted after determining the research result in advance rather than finding the research result through an interview analysis. The distinction between enablers and elements can also seem like a rather arbitrary interpretation, so it is better to reconstruct it from a more theoretical level.

• Response: I am not sure I understand what you mean correctly. I have revised the text in detail and I do not see how it could be interpreted as if the interviews were conducted after determining the results. I have made some changes to the text now that I hope will clarify that the results are based on the interviews findings and that the research was properly conducted.

In this regard, if possible, I would like to recommend that you consider modifying the enablers and elements in a way that separates them into local, national, and international contexts.

• Response: Thanks for this suggestion. However, the data as it was collected do not allow me to make these distinctions. I have added explanatory sentences in both sections.

In conclusion, what the researcher wants to propose through the analysis should be specified more. Although we agree that local culture and norms play an important role, further explanation is needed on the role of national and international contexts that is considered to be play an important role, and whether not the importance of local culture and norms is derived from that this study is at the regional level.

• Response: Thanks for this. I have expanded the discussion covering what you have suggested.

 

 

Reviewer 2:

The literature review/description is not well informed. In my opinion the literature review should also insert topics such as sustainability in cities (see for example, Rodrigues & Franco). In my opinion this paper focuses an interesting topic in area, but overall, the paper offers not an interesting overview for these topics here studied. Sustainability and creative cities topics should be inserted.

• Response: Thanks for this comment and for highlighting the literature on creative cities. I have included a completely new section (2.3) referring to the roots of sustainable cities and how this is linked to creative and smart cities as two examples of current topics.

The Method section should be supported with citations and more methodological procedures could be inserted. For example, case studies criteria of selection, data collection, data analysis. Also the protocol used (see Yin, 2015) should be inserted. In this section, the authors could more clearly to show the methodological procedures used. This methodology section is weak. It should be extended and reinforced.

• Response: Thanks very much for requesting this improvement. I have expanded the methods section following the proposed literature plus other sources to clearly explain my research design and the followed methods.

In Results section there is certain important points but the arguments are unconvincing. A more discussion about the empirical evidences is necessary. Overall, the manuscript makes some interesting points, but more innovative contributions should be given on theoretical and practical implications. Contributions for this research area and contingency theory should be reinforced. The conclusions and implications could be extended, innovative and more contributions should also be presented for this study context and an innovative framework should be proposed.

• Response: Thanks for these suggestions, which certainly help improve this article. I have expanded the discussion covering what you have suggested.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The authors inserted my suggestions. In my opinio the paper was extended, reinforced and improved.