2024 CBFA Pre-conference Summit

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We invite you to join a Pre-conference Summit: Global Business for the Healing of the Nations, held at the Calvin University School of Business. The Summit precedes the 2024 Christian Business Faculty Association Annual Conference.

Global Business for the Healing of the Nations

Christian businesspeople around the world have long supported the work of the church, helped build flourishing communities, and contributed to economic-development efforts through their entrepreneurship, management, and investments. Therefore, Christian business scholars, business schools, and business institutions have an opportunity to collaborate with their global colleagues to create new understandings and innovations, advance the Kingdom of God, and serve the world in new ways. Business as an institution is uniquely suited to help us realize “sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment, and decent work for all.”

Some potential topics that Christian business scholars might address are:

1. What does it mean for businesses to be Christ’s agent of renewal in the world at the individual, organizational, and societal levels? How might answers to these questions compare and contrast in different regions of the world?
2. What are the most important ways that businesses can contribute to the common good, and how do those ways differ systematically across nations? For instance, does the relative importance of participation, or subsidiarity, or solidarity vary with some or all of national culture, macroeconomic factors, or labor market structure?
3. What does it mean for Christians in business that all people are created in the image of God, and how should these understandings influence our human resource practices, domestically and globally?
4. What influence should faith have on how Christian business leaders think about operations and supply chain management in a global economy?
5. How do personal faith, or collective religious beliefs or practices, affect the motivations, experiences, and outcomes of entrepreneurs in the Global South? Do these motivations, experiences, and outcomes differ from those in the Global North?
6. How do personal faith, or collective religious beliefs or practices, affect the motivations, experiences, and outcomes of impact investors in the Global South? Do these motivations, experiences, and outcomes differ from those in the Global North?
7. How do personal faith, or collective religious beliefs or practices, affect the motivations, experiences, and outcomes of migrants in the workforce, whether upon expatriation or repatriation?
8. What are the attributes of business-as-mission (BAM) organizations that thrive in environments in which evangelical Christianity is officially disfavored?
9. Are there particular business practices or human-resources practices that contribute to peacemaking in conflict zones?
10. How should Christian businesspeople adapt to environments in which corruption or extortion (e.g., by government officials, criminal organizations, or agents of powerful vendors or customers) is widespread?
11. Are there mindsets or practices that Northern Christian organizations ought to avoid when partnering with local churches, charitable organizations, governments, or businesses in the Global South, and vice versa?
12. What new worldwide challenges for Christians in business are embedded in a spreading digital economy?
13. What is sound Christian guidance for adapting to artificial intelligence and other new features of the financial and information economy?
14. How do Christian insights into family business manifest themselves in different cultures and legal environments around the world?
15. What are the most effective models Christian business leaders are using around the world to promote “inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment, and decent work for all?”

Call for Proposals

Authors are invited to write papers and create presentations that explore the theme with respect to the range of business theories and practices, with meaningful implications for theory, practice, or pedagogy.

Proposals addressing topics besides those listed above are welcome, as long as they pertain to Christian business insights from the world outside of North America, or Christian business practices in the world outside of North America. Submissions are particularly encouraged from authors working at institutions outside of North America.

Submissions for the Summit should take the form of English-language paper proposals that do not exceed 1500 words, plus references; each proposal should state a thesis or a research question, outline the paper’s intended argument, and state implications either for theory, practice, or pedagogy. Submissions should not include any author-identifying information; each submission should be accompanied by a cover page in a separate file including the submission name, author names and affiliations, and contact information for the corresponding author.

Paper proposals should be submitted to jason.stansbury@calvin.edu by 11:59 PM EDT, on January 19, 2024. Please note the change in the deadline due to a malfunction of the previous email address which stopped accepting messages. Any author who has not received confirmation of the receipt of their submission within 24 hours should re-send their submission to jason.stansbury@calvin.edu.

Submission of a proposal indicates agreement by the corresponding author to review two paper proposals, and to send completed reviews no later than 11:59 PM on February 15, 2024, so that all submissions may be double-blind peer reviewed in a timely manner.

Corresponding authors of selected papers will be notified of their selection no later than March 15, 2024. Notified authors are asked to kindly send their acceptance or regrets within twelve business days of notification. Acceptance of an invitation to present at the Summit indicates that at least one of the authors will attend the Summit in its entirety, and that at least one of the authors will present the accepted paper at the Summit at the scheduled time.

Please direct questions to jason.stansbury@calvin.edu.

Lodging and Registration

The Summit will occur at the Prince Conference Center at Calvin University. A block of discounted hotel rooms has been reserved there for Summit attendees, and are available until October 1 for booking directly through the Prince Conference Center.

Summit registration is $100, and is payable by credit card. Registration is refundable (less a $25 processing fee) until September 1, 2024. Registration closes on October 1, 2024.

Lunch will be provided for Summit attendees on October 31. The Prince Conference Center provides complimentary breakfast for hotel guests.

Travel

Authors are encouraged to apply for B-1 visas at their United States Consulate or Embassy as soon as possible, in light of the long waits for interviews that prevail in many cases.

Attendees are responsible for arranging their own transportation to and from the Summit. The nearest airport is Gerald R. Ford International Airport (airport code GRR), which is roughly ten kilometers (six miles) away, and is served by American, Delta, and United airlines. Convenient ground transportation is available from the airport to the Prince Conference Center via taxi or rideshare service.

Limited funding may be available to help some attendees to offset certain travel costs. Corresponding authors of accepted papers are welcome to send detailed funding requests to jason.stansbury@calvin.edu. For full consideration, please submit all funding requests no later than July 15, 2024. Each eligible cost must include a complete price in USD, including all taxes and fees, for each line item for which a corresponding author is requesting funding. If awarded, funding will be applied directly to conference registration, lodging, and air travel, in that order of preference. Preference will be given to smaller requests, and to requests demonstrating material financial hardship. Funding will not be disbursed directly to individuals or academic institutions.

2024 CBFA Annual Conference

Summit attendees are warmly invited to extend their visit to attend CBFA 2024. The CBFA 2024 theme is also “Global Business for the Healing of the Nations.”

Registration

The registration deadline has passed.

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