2025 Conference on Outward Investment from Emerging Economies (OFDI)

The Copenhagen Conference on Outward Investment from Emerging Economies (OFDI) (www.cphofdi.net) has been at the forefront of research and discussion on multinationals from emerging markets since its inception in 2008. This year, the conference will be held outside Denmark for the first time, hosted by HTW Berlin in Berlin, Germany, in collaboration with the partner universities German International University in Cairo, Egypt, Technical University of Denmark, Copenhagen, Denmark, and Northeastern University, Boston, USA.

The 2025 OFDI Conference aims to promote better dialogue and understanding of the interplay between the three phenomena of green transition, emerging markets, and foreign direct investment (FDI) and its implications for global sustainability. Hence, the conference welcomes a broad array of papers that analyze any combination of these three phenomena.

General theme

While the unsustainable atmospheric buildup of greenhouse gases (GHG) originates primarily from high-income countries, today emerging economies account for the majority of global GHG emissions, with emissions continuing to rise. Growing energy demand in emerging economies sustains fossil fuel exploration and consumption, contributing to global climate challenges. Beyond climate change, these economies are also grappling with escalating environmental degradation, including air, water, and land pollution caused by industrial activities, urbanization, and resource extraction. The cumulative impact of these environmental challenges exacerbates health risks, disrupts ecosystems, and threatens sustainable development.

Emerging economies often bear the brunt of these environmental crises due to their geographic vulnerabilities, economic dependencies, institutional constraints, and limited capacities for adaptation and mitigation. At the same time, these nations hold promise for advancing green transitions, potentially unlocking new windows of opportunity for industrial upgrading, supported by FDI and innovative technologies. Successfully addressing climate change and environmental degradation requires coordinated efforts by national governments, multinational companies, supranational organizations, international financiers, and civil societies.

While the Paris Agreement of 2015 generated strong momentum for climate action and green transition, recent years have witnessed waning political and private sector support. This decline has coincided with a more confrontational geopolitical environment, trade and technology frictions, nationalist and populist tendencies, the restructuring of global value chains, and monetary tightening. Simultaneously, pollution of air, water, and soil continues to pose significant challenges, with waste mismanagement, industrial contamination, and agricultural runoffs undermining progress toward sustainability.

The activities of multinational companies and their FDI, alongside international financial flows, are deeply intertwined with environmental outcomes. On the one hand, these corporations possess the financial, technological, and organizational resources needed to address climate change and other forms of environmental degradation. On the other hand, they can perpetuate unsustainable practices, including shifting resource-intensive and polluting activities to emerging economies, engaging in environmental dumping, and contributing to carbon leakage and ecological damage.

The manifold interlinkages between green transitions, environmental sustainability, emerging economies, and FDI require deeper investigation. Empirical and conceptual analyses, coupled with science-based prescriptions, are essential to illuminate these complex relationships and guide global efforts toward achieving sustainable development while mitigating environmental harm.

Special theme

We welcome a broad spectrum of papers exploring green transition, emerging markets, or FDI. As a special theme, we are particularly interested in research that examines the bidirectional linkages between macro-level conditions and micro-level outcomes. We encourage studies that investigate how national policies and institutional frameworks influence firm-level market and non-market strategies and behaviors, and conversely, how corporate actions can shape and inform broader institutional and policy environments, especially in the context of emerging markets undergoing the challenges of green transition.

Papers exploring the macro-micro relations may focus on:

• Industrial policy frameworks for attracting sustainable FDI: Analyzing how emerging markets can design and implement policies that attract foreign investments in renewable energy and sustainable industries.
• Alignment of industrial policies with MNC strategies: Exploring the synergies and tensions between government industrial policies and multinational corporations' strategies in promoting sustainability in emerging markets.
• Impact of weak institutions on MNCs' sustainability strategies: Examining how weak institutions and institutional voids in emerging markets affect multinational corporations' non-market strategies, particularly their corporate environmental responsibility initiatives.

Papers exploring the micro-macro relations may focus on:

• MNCs as catalysts for institutional change: Assessing how multinational corporations can stimulate institutional development and sustainable practices in emerging markets through their operations and corporate social responsibility efforts.
• Corporate strategies shaping policy development: Exploring cases where MNCs' non-market strategies and particularly sustainability initiatives have led to the formulation or reform of environmental policies in host countries.
• Firm-level innovations driving macro-level sustainability transitions: Analyzing how innovations introduced by MNCs contribute to the broader adoption of green technologies and sustainable practices within emerging economies.

We look forward to contributions that deepen our understanding of these complex interrelations, offering insights into how macro-level policies and institutional conditions influence firm behavior, and how, in turn, corporate actions can shape broader industrial policy and institutional landscapes.

Submission process

We invite scholars across disciplines and methodologies working on these topics to submit to the conference. We especially encourage the submission of interdisciplinary and mixed-method analyses and work by scholars residing in emerging economies.

Papers may not exceed 40 pages, following Academy of Management Journal guidelines.

Please submit your paper to: Yzabellune.Run-Grueger@HTW-Berlin.de

For inquiries, please contact:Florian.Becker-Ritterspach@HTW-Berlin.de

Registration fees

• High-income countries (World Bank definition): Regular, EUR 275; PhD student, EUR 125
• Middle/low-income countries: Regular, EUR 175; PhD student, EUR 75

At least one author must register per paper accepted for presentation.

Key dates

• Paper submission deadline: June 1, 2025
• Notification of acceptance: June 15, 2025
• Registration opens: June 15, 2025
• Registration deadline: September 15, 2025
• Conference dates: October 23–24, 2025

Please note that the conference will be held exclusively in person.

A conference-related special issue with the journal Critical Perspectives on International Business (CPOIB) is in preparation.