In recent years, the search for innovative pathways towards sustainability has been brought to the forefront of international agenda settings. While international organisations and institutions, such as the United Nations and the European Union (EU), mobilised around the grand challenge of sustainability, on both a local and a global scale, eco-innovation as a key concept (or buzzword) started emerging and consolidating in policy documents and funding schemes. By focusing on the European context, this paper aims to explore how the discourse of eco-innovation has been framed by the EU research funding programmes Horizon 2020 since the introduction of the 2011 Eco-Innovation Action Plan. The review was conducted by using content analysis methods designed to disclose the framing of eco-innovation in the EU programmes. The article presents three main findings: the eco-innovation discourse in the EU programmes has mostly become constructed around the notion of eco-efficiency; eco-innovation is overwhelmingly framed as a dialectic between the state vs private actors whereas stakeholders in the third sector such as cooperatives, nongovernmental organisations, social enterprises, and community-based initiatives are largely neglected; eco-innovation as a buzzword has been losing relevance through the years in favour of the new rising discourse of the 'circular economy'. The article concludes by highlighting that the construction of a new discourse on circular economy may provide the opportunity to embrace more eco-centric and inclusive approaches to economics, towards stronger sustainability and not-forprofit organisations. Word count (including table/figure captions and references): 10,832

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The last decade has seen a flourishing of social agriculture cooperatives and the exponential growth of the craft beer sector in Italy. Social microbreweries (social cooperatives that operate in the craft beer sector) have started emerging but have not yet been a focus of research. This paper explores the relationship between social agriculture and microbreweries in Italy, bridging the gap between social agricultural cooperation and craft beer production. It deploys a qualitative multiple case study methodology, based on the in-depth analysis of three case studies: Vecchia Orsa, one of the oldest social microbreweries in Italy; Pintalpina, which operates in a unique alpine setting; Articioc, established by a group of friends with a love of craft beer. This research suggests that the craft beer sector provides important opportunities for social innovation in social cooperatives, with a particular focus on the work integration of vulnerable people. In addition, this paper highlights different pathways for scaling social microbreweries, including focusing on organisational growth (growing the size of the business), scaling out (impacting greater numbers) and scaling deep (impacting cultural roots). Different scaling approaches are united by a common scaling strategy: network and partnership building. This emerges as an essential action to increase the impact of social microbreweries.

It has become normative in organization and management studies literature to consider scaling as a synonym for organizational growth. Scaling is typically understood as scaling-up. This article demonstrates that, in the context of post-growth organizations, scaling involves a more complex set of dynamics. Directing scholarly attention to scaling in the context of Italian Social Agricultural Cooperatives (i.e. organizations that hold a different rationale and modus operandi from the capitalist enterprise), this research contributes to the literature on scaling the impact of post-growth organizations by identifying nine different scaling routes: organizational growth (vertical and horizontal); organizational downscaling; impact on policies; multiplication; impact on organizational culture; impact on societal culture; aggregation; and diffusion. This article demonstrates that post-growth scaling: (1) requires the synergistic interaction of different strategies; (2) focuses on impacting societal culture; (3) does not necessarily require organizational growth; and (4) is a relational process, embedded in socio-ecological systems. The typology presented in this article empowers post-growth organizations to become more aware of different available scaling routes, unlocking their transformative potential and supporting the transition towards a post-growth future, in which the goal of economics is the pursuit of human and ecological flourishing.