Sustainable Markets

TLDR

Critiques of fast fashion highlight its negative environmental and social impacts, yet it remains uncertain whether slow fashion can ultimately counteract fast fashion’s global dominance due to trade‑offs and conflicts. This study seeks to identify the motivations and barriers that influence actors in the slow fashion movement and to propose remedies that could help shift the fashion system toward greater sustainability. The authors use slow fashion as a case study to explore its holistic definition of sustainability and to analyze the motivations and barriers that shape participation in the movement.

Abstract

Examining the critiques of the current fashion system and alternative approaches to fast fashion reveal a growing awareness of the negative implications of mindless fashion production and consumption. The purpose of this study is to understand how the fashion system driven by speed, change, product obsolescence, and aesthetic fads, can be challenged and repositioned to encourage greater sustainability. Slow fashion has been selected as a context to examine the emergence of an alternative system, as it develops a holistic understanding of what constitutes sustainable fashion. However, it is still unclear whether the slow fashion movement can eventually challenge the global dominance of fast fashion, as many trade-offs and conflicts are involved. We aim to contribute to previous scholarly work by shedding light on the motivating factors that encourage different actors to participate in the slow fashion movement and on the barriers that keep the network from mobilizing. We also offer possible remedies that we hope will be beneficial for scholars and practitioners working to build a more sustainable fashion system.