Integrating Behavioural Sustainability Into Corporate Strategy: A Systematic Literature Review and Conceptual Framework

Abstract

Behavioural sustainability has emerged as a strategically significant construct for understanding how sustainability becomes embedded in organisational routines, decisions, and governance systems rather than remaining at the level of symbolic commitment. Despite growing scholarly attention, the construct remains conceptually contested and its relationship to established frameworks such as corporate social responsibility, green human resource management, and sustainability implementation has not been critically examined. This systematic literature review addresses that gap by examining how behavioural sustainability is conceptualised and strategically integrated within firms. Following PRISMA 2020 reporting principles, the review analyses 42 peer‐reviewed studies published between 2005 and 2025 using descriptive mapping and theory‐informed thematic synthesis. Three interconnected analytical lenses guide the review: behavioural microfoundations, institutional and stakeholder dynamics, and management control and governance systems. The findings demonstrate that apparently divergent conceptualisations of behavioural sustainability reflect different emphases within a coherent multi‐level construct spanning individual behaviour, organisational routinisation, and system‐level governance, rather than representing genuinely incompatible theoretical positions. Four mechanism families are identified as supporting strategic integration: human resource practices that build behavioural capability, legitimisation processes that move sustainability beyond symbolic compliance, stakeholder engagement and translation processes that stabilise priorities across organisational levels, and governance interventions that embed sustainability in decision structures and accountability systems. Evidence on long‐term durability remains uneven, with stronger support from longitudinal and case‐based studies than from cross‐sectional research, and the review identifies procedural decoupling at the governance level as a significant but underexplored risk in the literature. Interpreting these findings, the study develops the Behavioural Sustainability Integration Framework (BSIF), which conceptualises strategic integration as an iterative design‐govern‐reinforce architecture and advances four propositions for future empirical testing. The framework contributes to theory by specifying the causal relationships through which behavioural sustainability becomes durable, identifying the boundary conditions under which each function operates, and positioning behavioural sustainability as a distinct strategy construct that addresses an explanatory gap that adjacent frameworks do not fill.