Timeline

• November 30, 2026: Submission deadline

Timeline

• December 31, 2026: Full paper submission deadline

Timeline

• October 30, 2026: Full paper submission deadline

Timeline

• August 1, 2026: Submission deadline

Louis Fauger, Amazon Research & Georgia Institute of Technology

Markus Gerschberger, University of Applied Sciences Upper Austria

Matthieu Lauras, KEDGE Business School

The Physical Internet (PI) is moving from vision to reality. Beyond foundational concepts, organizations are now experimenting with pilots, demonstrators, living labs and large-scale initiatives that test how PI principles can be implemented, governed and scaled. This Special Issue seeks rigorous, practice-oriented and empirically grounded contributions that provide actionable insights for managers, policymakers and supply chain stakeholders. The Special Issue is associated with the IPIC 2026 International Conference (June 2026, France), but submissions are open to all authors.

We welcome papers focusing on the implementation and operationalization of the PI, including empirical studies (qualitative, quantitative or mixed methods), case studies, pilots, demonstrators and living labs, practice-based research and industry-driven innovations, and funded projects and cross-industry initiatives. Conceptual contributions are welcome only if strongly connected to real implementation challenges and managerial implications.

All submissions are expected to adopt a sound scientific methodology while clearly demonstrating managerial relevance and actionable lessons learned.

Potential topics

• PI use cases, pilots and demonstrators
• Business models and value creation in open and shared logistics
• Governance and coordination mechanisms for interoperable networks
• Supply chain intelligence, data sharing and digital platforms
• Transition pathways, roadmaps and maturity models
• Managerial and organizational challenges of PI adoption
• Public policy, regulation and public–private collaboration
• Sustainability, circular logistics and environmental performance
• Empirical studies (qualitative, quantitative or mixed methods)
• Case studies, pilots, demonstrators and living labs
• Practice-based research and industry-driven innovations
• Funded projects and cross-industry initiatives

Timeline

• June 1, 2026: Submission platform opened
• November 30, 2026: Paper submission deadline

Adèle Fouché, Université de Tours

François Fulconis, Aix-Marseille Université

Gilles Paché, Aix-Marseille Université

Logistics and supply chain management are currently well-structured, stabilized fields dominated by normative, technicist and performance-oriented approaches. Classical themes such as flow and process optimization, rationalization of logistics infrastructure, supply chain resilience, global supply chains and sustainability, emerging technologies and digital transformation of data flows have contributed to establishing the scientific and managerial legitimacy of the discipline. However, such normalization carries a risk of reducing analytical perspective, leading to the invisibility of practices, actors and dynamics that are nonetheless constitutive of logistics logics.

In response to this observation, this special issue proposes to explore another path: that of heterodox logistics, understood as a scientific approach aimed at questioning the blind spots of the field, displacing analytical frameworks and opening new, even iconoclastic perspectives. The goal is to move beyond conventional approaches to understand logistics as a social fact traversed by historical, political, cultural and sometimes transgressive issues.

From this perspective, logistics is not limited to the efficient management of licit and visible flows of products and information. It can also be examined through fields and objects considered 'non-standard' or 'sensitive': informal economies, parallel networks, illicit circulations, clandestine systems, controversial historical devices or marginal social practices. Such configurations, often relegated to the margins of academic discourse, nevertheless offer powerful empirical spaces for understanding the materiality of flows, alternative forms of coordination and power logics that structure supply chains.

Research can interrogate the logistical dimensions of phenomena such as trafficking (drugs, weapons, organs, counterfeits, etc.) or human trafficking economies (past or contemporary slavery systems, sexual exploitation, forced labor, constrained begging, irregular migration, as well as parallel circuits and black markets during wartime). These contexts highlight highly sophisticated organizational forms, capable of articulating physical constraints, human coordination and informational devices in uncertain or even hostile environments.

Beyond these different fields, heterodox logistics also invites revisiting more classical objects from a renewed perspective: long history of infrastructures, military logistics, colonialism and resource circulation, logistics of humanitarian crises, or governance of flows in fragile institutional contexts. These approaches reveal continuities and ruptures between so-called 'legitimate' and 'illegitimate' logistics, as well as increasing hybridizations between the two.

This special issue aims to gather ambitious interdisciplinary contributions, mobilizing varied theoretical frameworks (sociology, history, geography, industrial economics, economics, politics, anthropology, legal sciences, political science, etc.) to enrich understanding of logistical phenomena. Critical, reflexive and exploratory approaches are particularly encouraged. Theoretical, empirical or methodological contributions proposing original and rigorous analyses are invited. Works based on atypical fieldwork, historical archives, in-depth qualitative surveys or comparative approaches will be particularly valued. Purely descriptive or strictly normative articles do not correspond to the spirit of this special issue, which aims to contribute to broadening the scope of research in logistics and supply chain management, assuming an exploratory and critical posture. It addresses researchers wishing to question established views, displace the boundaries of the field and propose alternative readings of contemporary and past logistical phenomena.

Potential topics

• Logistical practices in informal, illegal or clandestine contexts
• Rethinking classical supply chain management concepts (performance, resilience, coordination, visibility) through non-standard configurations
• Continuities between historical logistics (slavery, colonization) and contemporary systems
• Organization of flow circulation in constrained, uncertain or hostile environments
• Role of infrastructure, institutions and technologies in alternative systems
• Post-COVID-19 supply chain disruptions and the just-in-time model
• Heterodox logistics approaches for industrial sovereignty and relocalization
• Short supply chains as central elements of heterodox logistics
• Construction and recomposition of licit/illicit boundaries in supply chains
• Ethical, political and societal implications of studying these objects
• Theoretical and methodological renewal of logistics and supply chain management research

Timeline

• January 7, 2027: Full manuscript submission deadline

Paul Tae-Woo Lee, Zhejiang University

Kai-Chieh Hu, Soochow University

Kyoung-Suk Choi, Jeonbuk National University

International organizations such as International Maritime Organization (IMO), European Union (EU), and United National Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) have begun implementing regulations and guidelines for decarbonization of transportation, manufacturing, and logistics industries. The IMO's 2023 Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Strategy targets net-zero GHG emissions from international shipping by or around 2050. The EU has adopted the EU Emission Trading System (ETS), effective on 1 January 2024, and the FuelEU, effective on 1 January 2025. The above two organisations have driven stakeholders in maritime transportation and logistics toward net-zero pathways through regulatory and pricing measures. Meanwhile, the green shipping corridor (GSC) by the Clydebank Declaration at the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) to the UNFCCC has been initiated in November 2021, based on the IMO's regulations, the Paris Agreement, and others, aiming at decarbonizing the maritime industry.

Unlike the IMO and the EU, since COP29, GSC has aimed to integrate land and river transportation modes into sea transportation to achieve overall decarbonization of multimodal transport. In particular, major cargo owners, as one of ten stakeholders of GSC (e.g., Amazon, IKEA, Unilever, Walmart, BP Oil), have committed to transporting their cargoes by zero-emission vessels within the time frame announced. In addition, other stakeholders such as port authorities, shipbuilding companies, shipping companies, ship classification societies, central governments, green fuel producers, not to mention the IMO and the EU, have formed a coalition platform at every COP meeting to promote decarbonization at sea and a multimodal transport network.

As for maritime transportation and logistics and supply chain management, the rapid advancement in artificial intelligence (AI) and big data technologies has become a catalyst of digital transformation and driving force to accelerate convergence towards net-zero carbon emissions. The integration of AI and big data technologies can be applied for optimizing logistical operations and minimizing carbon footprints through real-time monitoring, demand forecasting, and route optimization to reduce fuel consumption and GHG emissions in logistics and transportation. These analytical capabilities allow organizations to improve the environmental performance and ensure that emission reductions can be realized through data-driven decision-making.

All stakeholders in the industries and governments have shifted from advocacy to setting up more targeted goals that they should achieve by the given time frame in the context of the net-zero paths. The stakeholders in the transport, logistics, and supply chain industries are facing three key challenges in implementing net-zero paths: challenges of higher capital costs (CAPEX) and higher operating costs (OPEX) to use green fuel energy in association with new vehicles and new technologies in the context of green transport and logistics chains model, and the need to establish sustainable green energy supply chains. To cope with them, the stakeholders in the industries and governments should seek key success factors in implementing it. Existing literature have not addressed these challenges in comprehensive and integrated approaches.

This Special Issue on Net-Zero Pathways in Logistics, Transportation, and Supply Chain Management aims to address not only reduction of direct emissions from transport operations, modal shift, use of alternative fuels, but also transformation of entire supply chains through AI-powered digitalization and adoption of new technologies. This SI contributes to exploring how to enable the logistics and transportation industries to achieve carbon reduction in their supply chains and multimodal transportation network and how to adopt AI and big data technologies and pricing and incentivization policies to support decarbonization technology adoption. The findings in the SI contributes to providing research community and practitioners in transport, logistics and supply chains with managerial and policy insights and expanding literature of net-zero pathways in logistics, transportation, and supply chain management.

Potential topics

• Decarbonization pathways for transport and logistics services
• Zero-emission freight transport
• Decarbonization and digitalization in transport and logistics services
• Application of AI & big data for decarbonization
• Green shipping and digital corridors
• Green transport and logistics models
• Green fuel supply chains, comprising supply, transport, and storage
• Green energy transitions in smart cities
• Sustainable procurement for net-zero transitions
• Regenerative supply chain design and resilient networks
• Electrification of transport fleets and charging infrastructure challenges
• Policy, regulation, and carbon pricing impacts on logistics decarbonisation
• Safety and environmental monitoring

Timeline

• Invalid DateTime: Paper proposal submission deadline
• April 30, 2027: Full manuscript submission deadline

Maciel Queiroz, FGV EAESP

Morgane Fritz, Excelia Business School

Britta Gammelgaard, University of Southern Denmark

Logistics and supply chain management (L/SCM) have advanced through analytical rigor and empirical refinement. However, the contemporary landscape, shaped by geopolitical shifts, digital transformation, climate pressures, and evolving societal expectations, requires more than incremental extensions of existing models. It calls for a reconsideration of the assumptions, values, and conceptual boundaries that underpin the field. Many of the most pressing challenges in L/SCM today are not only empirical, but also normative, philosophical, and inherently interdisciplinary.

This special issue seeks essays that move beyond established paradigms and offer reflective, provocative, and conceptually grounded perspectives that offer new lenses and open new directions for research and practice. The objective is to complement empirical work by fostering ideas that challenge, reframe, and extend our understanding of L/SCM.

Essays should articulate a coherent argument, engage with relevant scholarly conversations, and demonstrate originality, while remaining open to alternative forms of reasoning and expression. Contributions may draw on theory, practice, or lived experience, but should aim to question dominant assumptions, surface overlooked tensions, or propose new ways of thinking.

L/SCM intersects with organization studies, strategy, international business, human resource management, and entrepreneurship, among other fields. Engaging with these perspectives enables richer understandings of issues such as power, governance, labor, innovation, and institutional complexity in L/SCM.

This is an invitation to think differently. Essays should be rigorous, reflective, and bold, capable of not only interpreting the field's evolution but also actively shaping its future.

Potential topics

• Algorithmic management and the reconfiguration of work in logistics
• Supply chains as political and strategic infrastructures
• Entrepreneurial supply chains in contexts of institutional fragility
• Efficiency versus dignity: ethical boundaries of automation
• Decolonizing supply chain theory and practice
• Beyond resilience: strategic adaptation, transformation, and fragility
• Platformization and ecosystem competition in logistics
• Invisible labor and precarity in digitally mediated supply chains
• Sustainability, legitimacy, and organizational narratives
• The role of human resources in supply chain management
• Temporal trade-offs: speed, flexibility, and human well-being
• Culture, identity, and coordination in global supply networks
• Human–AI collaboration and decision authority in SCM
• Moral responsibility and accountability in complex supply networks
• Business model innovation in circular and regenerative supply chains
• Reimagining SCM theory: integration, borrowing, or paradigm shift?

Timeline

• May 21, 2026: Opening date for abstract submissions
• September 30, 2026: Closing date for abstract submissions
• November 30, 2026: Opening date for manuscript submissions
• April 30, 2027: Closing date for manuscript submissions