Ecological Governance and Organisational Resilience: A Structural Model of Environmental Risk in Pandemic Conditions

Abstract

This study seeks to identify and sequence the determinants that shape environmental risk management within workplaces during and after a pandemic. The research design integrates a systematic review of recent academic and practitioner literature with structured data collection, rigorous analysis, and the derivation of practical implications. The literature review produced a preliminary catalogue of determinants that was subsequently validated by a panel of sixteen experts drawn, through purposive sampling, from diverse stakeholder groups, environmental regulators, industry representatives, and professional practitioners, so as to capture a broad range of perspectives relevant to ecological governance. Analytical procedures relied on interpretive structural modelling and on matrix impact cross multiplication applied to classification. These complementary techniques revealed a hierarchical configuration of influence among the determinants. The “level of company operations” occupied the base tier, indicating relatively limited systemic influence, whereas “environmental analysis of business activities” emerged at the apex, underscoring its pivotal role in structuring effective risk-mitigation strategies. Within the dependence–driving matrix, the operational-level determinant displayed high dependence and low driving power, confirming its status as an outcome variable, while all remaining determinants exhibited both dependence and driving power, thereby classifying them as linkage variables that reciprocally influence one another. As the first empirical investigation to map workplace environmental risk drivers in a pandemic context, this research enriches the literature with nuanced insights. Its findings offer actionable guidance to regulatory bodies, international agencies, policymakers, researchers, and industry managers seeking to strengthen ecological stewardship and organisational resilience in the face of current and future public-health crises.