As suggested earlier, the research study emerged from personal interest within the field of sustainability marketing, the larger global context of sustainability and educating for sustainability development as well as the paradox between a sustainability marketing curriculum, marketing curriculum and marketing practice. A requirement for this phase of the research study was to obtain ‘rich’ and ‘thick’ descriptions from the participants regarding these issues. This necessitated a careful selection of the research participants.
Earlier assessment of the status survey revealed only two other institutions (outside of the researchers) that included social issues such as ethics in their marketing curriculum. Hence, the choice was made to select ‘experts’ in marketing and/or sustainability in South Africa, marketing practitioners involved in sustainability as well as senior academics in the discipline of marketing.
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The broad landscape of the HEIs also rationalised the choice of an ‘expert’ from a University of Technology to consider if their specific context of higher education influenced perspectives of sustainability marketing and sustainability marketing curriculum in a particular way.
A purposive non-probability sampling technique was used to identify six participants to interview. This was considered theoretically ideal because it allowed for variation, was not too large and allowed for individual voices to emerge83.
The literature chapter also revealed sustainability marketing as an issue that involved a diversity of individuals and stakeholders that constituted marketing academics, marketing practitioners as well as those that were directly involved in sustainability issues. Additionally, this diversity of individuals and stakeholders offered the opportunity for different paradigm perspectives to be interrogated.
Subsequently, this allowed for the participants to be linked directly to the conceptual framework of academic marketing paradigms. Based on the characteristics of the channel program’84, the participant portrayals were assigned to: ‘The History Channel: The Apologists’; ‘The Business Channel: The Social Marketer’ and ‘The Discovery Channel: The Reconstructionists’. A detailed account of the participants’ viewpoints within the channels and programmes are presented in Chapter 4. This is further illustrated in Table 3.1. which offered a brief description of each of the participants, their paradigm perspective and their
‘programme’.
83 The literature review, the status survey in phase 1 and my own relationships with academics and other stakeholders in the field informed the choice of the participants. I would therefore declare my own bias that may have influenced the interviews in cases where the participants were known to me. This was true in the case of Daniel, Tash and Mishca. However, since sustainability marketing and the sustainability marketing curriculum were found to be relatively new areas of research in the South African higher education context, this was considered a necessary approach to the sample selection as the participants were considered as part of an ‘expert-opinion survey’.
84 The program content speaks to the issues of the nature of market, the core concept of marketing, the scope of marketing and the primary responsibility of marketing.
68 Name of
participant Position and experience Paradigm Program
Randy (University) Head of
Department: Marketing and former marketing practitioner
‘The Apologist’ The History Channel
Daniel (University of Technology) Head of Department:
Marketing
‘The Apologist’ The History Channel
Tash Marketing practitioner in a sustainability industry.
Currently an MBA student of marketing.
‘The Social Marketer’; The Business Channel
Seline Marketing practitioner and
sustainability manager ‘The Social Marketer’ The Business Channel Latisha Sustainability expert and
academic The ‘Reconstructionist’ The Discovery Channel Mishca Senior marketing academic and
marketing expert The ‘Reconstructionist’ The Discovery Channel
Table 3.1. Description of the research participants
Finally, from a research procedural perspective in relation to the selection of the participants, all of the interview participants were contacted via email and/or telephone to set up an appropriate interview time. The interviews were conducted subject to the participants’
availability and the duration of the interviews were between forty-five minutes to an hour in length. All participants were asked to sign a consent form and were assured of their anonymity.
The participants that were selected for the study included a varied group of individuals, negating the use of a standardised interview schedule. The interviews schedules were adapted to include questions relevant to the context of the participants.
As the interview process began, the input from each completed interview was also used in adapting the interview schedules for interviews scheduled at a later date. There were some standardised questions included in the interview schedules, which related to the participants background experiences and conceptions of sustainability. These interview schedules are included in the list of appendices. In the next section of this chapter, the manner in which the data gleaned from the portrayals will be discussed before the final deliberation regarding validity issues in this study.
As per the requirements of the University research office, all research studies are subject to the criteria for ethical clearance to conduct research. The ethical clearance application for this study was submitted and successfully granted. This is included in the list of appendices.
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The ethical procedure ensured that there was no harm brought to the participants by participating in the research study. The study required that gatekeeper letters be sent out to participants to request their permission to be involved in the study. Participants were requested to sign consent forms to confirm their participation in the study. The participant’s names were changed and their anonymity and confidentiality of their institution and/or place of work was maintained. The participants were also made aware that they could withdraw from participating in the study at any time.
As the researcher it was also important to honour the promises made to the participants. The ethicality of the study was maintained procedurally. Additionally, the participants were respected in terms of the opinions they gave as these opinions were not altered. The voices of the participants emerged throughout their portrayals to maintain the integrity of the study. The participants were always privy to information about the research study and therefore not manipulated or deceived in the interview process.