New publication: EU Water Directives through a Semiotic Lens: Framing Quality, Risk, and Circularity

Published in Frontiers in Environmental Science, August 2025
Cordeiro, C.M. (2025). EU water directives through a semiotic lens: Framing quality, risk, and circularity. Frontiers in Environmental Science, 13:1590166.

The European Union’s water governance framework is widely recognized for its clear legal architecture, offering predictable compliance structures and harmonized standards across Member States. Yet, the language that enables this clarity and coordination may also influence how environmental concepts are interpreted and implemented. Understanding how such language constructs meaning is essential for evaluating both the strengths and limitations of EU water policy.

Beyond Compliance: The Power of Language in Policy

EU water law not only regulates environmental behavior; it also plays a constitutive role in shaping how key policy concepts such as quality, risk, and circularity, are defined and operationalized. This study applies a triadic semiotic framework, drawing on Greimassian structuralism, Social Semiotics, and Ecosemiotics, to examine 11 foundational EU water directives, including the Water Framework Directive, the Nitrates Directive, and the Water Reuse Regulation. Through this lens, the analysis explores how regulatory texts frame environmental priorities, assign agency, and embed specific worldviews that influence implementation and policy outcomes.

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Situating the discourse of recycled nutrient fertilizers in circular economy principles for sustainable agriculture

The article explores the multifaceted discourse surrounding recycled nutrient fertilizers (RNFs), examining their technological, environmental, economic, and policy-related dimensions. It highlights how stakeholders’ perceptions and the influence of public and farmer acceptance shape the adoption of RNFs, alongside the critical impact of regulatory and policy frameworks on their implementation.

Citation: Cordeiro CM and Sindhøj E (2024) Situating the discourse of recycled nutrient fertilizers in circular economy principles for sustainable agriculture. Front. Sustain. 5:1465752. doi: 10.3389/frsus.2024.1465752

HCII 2023 Copenhagen, Denmark, July 23–28
Communicating Sustainability Online: A Soft Systems Methodology and Corpus Linguistics Approach in the Example of Norwegian Seafood Companies

Human Computer Interaction (HCI) in Business, Government and Organizations, 10th International Conference, HCIBGO 2023, Held as Part of the 25th HCI International Conference, HCI International 2023, Copenhagen, Denmark, July 23–28, 2023, Proceedings, Part II Conference proceedings 2023.

Abstract

This article presents a qualitative case study of the Norwegian seafood industry’s sustainability communication on corporate websites. The research questions focused on how sustainability is communicated, and the communication channels employed by Norwegian seafood companies. The study found that sustainability is communicated through ecological certification, awareness towards the environment and social compliance, and engagement in knowledge exchange. The study highlights the need to create standardized language and a coherent discourse for competitive advantages in ecologically value-added products and digital services. Companies can use underutilized digital resources such as podcasts and direct online sales to consumers to improve stakeholder engagement. The study suggests the direct and active involvement of consumers in designing products that consumers desire, which can increase market share for the Norwegian seafood industry. The limitations of the study are the lack of feedback from small to medium-sized companies, limiting the generalizability of the findings. The study recommends that the Norwegian seafood industry supports developing digital service resources for small and medium-sized companies to remain competitive in the long term.

Keywords

sustainability, corporate online communication, seafood, soft systems methodology, corpus linguistics

Cite as:
Lindström, N.B., Cordeiro, C.M. (2023). Communicating Sustainability Online: A Soft Systems Methodology and Corpus Linguistics Approach in the Example of Norwegian Seafood Companies. In: Nah, F., Siau, K. (eds) HCI in Business, Government and Organizations. HCII 2023. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 14039. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-36049-7_25

Book chapter publications, edited series

Chapter 2 Emerging management concepts in an era of global transitions:Co-management of natural resources and the Swedish management style.

Reference Cordeiro, C. M. (2021). Emerging management concepts in an era of global transitions: Co-management of natural resources and the Swedish management style. In Saruchera, F. (Ed.), Advanced Perspectives on Global Industry Transitions and Business Opportunities (pp. 21-39). IGI Global. http://doi:10.4018/978-1-7998-4303-0.ch002

Abstract In a period of global transition, this chapter discusses emerging management practices in the context of natural resources management in international business. In the past decades, the co-management concept and practice have been of increasing interest to scholars in ecology management and marine environment management. In the late 1980s, the Swedish management style began to be explicitly de-bated with scholarly interest, particularly in the services industry after observing successful business practices. The literature on the co-management of natural resources and the Swedish management style in multinational enterprises point promisingly towards parallel management strategies applied in dis-tinctly different working environments and contexts. Based on empirical data, this chapter’s objective is to highlight and distill from natural resources co-management and the Swedish management style a shared management best-practice approach in working contexts that have multiple actors and stakehold-ers who hold multicentric agendas.

Chapter 9 Culture from a value systems perspective: A study of CATCH, an interdisciplinary research project in fisheries and aquaculture in Norway

Reference Cordeiro, C.M. & Sogn-Grundvåg, G. (2020). Culture from a value systems perspective: A study of CATCH, an interdisciplinary research project in fisheries and aquaculture in Norway. In R. Brunet-Thornton (ed), Examining Cultural Perspectives in a Globalized World. Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi: 10.4018/978-1-7998-0214-3

Abstract International interdisciplinary projects (IDR) are a microcosm of multicultural landscapes. Through a culture theories perspective, in particular, viewing culture as a system of explicitly and implicitly coded values, this chapter conveys the processes and results of a study that investigates and uncovers the management strategies of an IDR project, CATCH. The study of culture from a value systems approach enables a more subtle and nuanced approach to the analysis and framing of cultural heterogeneity in the context of an IDR project, beyond the often dichotomous, cultural dimensions construct. Due to the multiple actors in an IDR project, the example of CATCH illustrates too, a more nuanced view of cultural filters that arise from each academic discipline. Using the culture as value systems perspective, this chapter shows how multicultural landscapes and different resulting knowledges can be leveraged towards an integrated worldview when solving challenges in a globalized world with limited resources.

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New publication, Oct 2018

Title

Language as heteroglot: The bridging qualities of Swedish-English (SweE) and Singapore Colloquial English (SCE) in cross-cultural working environments

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to reframe the role and function of perceived “bad English” in an international business (IB) context to illustrate that “bad English” could in fact facilitate cross-cultural communication in individuals who do not have English as first language.

Design/methodology/approach

This study uses the Bakhtinian concept of heteroglossia as a theoretical framework. For the method of analysis, applied linguistics is used in particular through the lens of systemic functional linguistics (SFL) as discourse analysis method to analyze transcribed interview texts. Data collection is via long interviews with 33 top level managers in Swedish managed organizations in Singapore offices.

Findings

The study illustrates, through respondent interviews and discourse analysis, that perceived “bad English” could help facilitate communication across cultures in a cross-cultural working context. The study also shows how different individuals, depending on personal experience and cultural background, employ different means to navigate and manage language differences at work. Continue reading ”New publication, Oct 2018”

New publication, April 2018


Title

Which User of technology? Perspectivising the UTAUT model by application of the SFL language Pronoun System towards a systems perspective of technology acceptance and use

Abstract

This study applies systemic functional linguistics (SFL) as complementary framework of analysis of technology acceptance models (TAMs). The purpose is to bridge research methodology language in international business (IB) studies and engineering management science. Currently TAMs and its consolidated version, the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) provides for a typology of one user in one context scenario. The need for the UTAUT model to account for multiple users in multiple work contexts in a single framework of analysis was foregrounded in the study of the workflow processes of a remote services business model of a European founded multinational business enterprise (MBE) with regards to its (i) intra-firm improvements in managing remote services cases, and its (ii) extra-firm selling of life cycle management remote services contracts. The Enterprise has global operations in over 100 countries, of which this study focused on its European operations of improving the quality of remote services for the marine industry. Through an application of SFL unto UTAUT, this study illustrates how multiple users in multiple contexts can be analysed simultaneously, and whose behaviours can be accounted for in a single framework of analysis. The combined SFL UTAUT model addresses the initial statisticity of the UTAUT model, whilst at the same time, expands upon current theoretical perspectives of technology use and acceptance that can be applied in practice.

Keywords

Research methodology, Unified theory of acceptance and use of Technology (UTAUT), Systemic functional linguistics (SFL), International business, Technology management, Remote service

Reference
Cordeiro, C. M. (2018). Which User of technology? Perspectivising the UTAUT model by application of the SFL language Pronoun System towards a systems perspective of technology acceptance and use, ASTESJ Advances in Science, Technology and Engineering Systems Journal, 3(2): 309-318. DOI: 10.25046/aj030234

Article open access at:

Which User of technology? Perspectivising the UTAUT model by application of the SFL language Pronoun System towards a systems perspective of technology acceptance and use

New publication, March 2018

Title

Using systemic functional linguistics as method in identifying semogenic strategies in intercultural communication: A study of the collocation of “time” and “different” by Swedish managers with international management experiences

Abstract

Theoretical foundations to intercultural communication (ICC) are integrative and interdisciplinary but few have studied ICC from a systemic linguistics perspective. Viewing communication as a dialogic process, this study takes a systemic functional linguistics (SFL) view of language as a socialsemiotic where semogenesis (meaning making) is both construed and construed by context of situation which in turn is construed by culture. Using interview data collected from Swedish managers who have extensive international management experiences, this study aims to illustrate how SFL can be used as an adaptive theory and framework of discourse analysis in uncovering semogenic strategies in ICC processes.

Keywords

systemic functional linguistics; social semiotics; intercultural communication; cross-culture communication; semogenesis; semogenic strategies; adaptive linguistic theory

Reference
Cordeiro, C. M. (2018). Using systemic functional linguistics as method in identifying semogenic strategies in intercultural communication: A study of the collocation of “time” and “different” by Swedish managers with international management experiences, Journal of Intercultural Communication Research, DOI: 10.1080/17475759.2018.1455601

Article open access at:
https://doi.org/10.1080/17475759.2018.1455601

The theory of Autopoiesis.
Reflections on New Year’s eve of 2018

Text & Photo © JE Nilsson, CM Cordeiro 2017

In the days leading up to the New Year’s eve of 2017, I found myself revisiting what I wrote about the concepts of complexity and autopoiesis a few years ago.

The concept of autopoiesis, organisms as self-generating, was developed by Maturana and Varela [1,2] in the field of biology, primarily as a construct that enabled a distinction to be made between living and nonliving systems. Niklas Luhmann, in his turn adapted this concept from biological systems theory and generalized it for building a new social system theory.

Continue reading ”The theory of Autopoiesis.
Reflections on New Year’s eve of 2018″