Aikaterini Argyrou

Aikaterini Argyrou, LLM, is a Doctoral Research Fellow at Nyenrode Business University and a Ph.D candidate affiliated to the Utrecht Centre for Water, Oceans and Sustainability Law of Utrecht University (UCWOSL). Since 2013 and as of today Aikaterini Argyrou undertakes a multidisciplinary doctoral research on sustainability and social entrepreneurship. Her research focuses on the examination of a normative framework that delivers substance to the concept of sustainability in entrepreneurship and company law from the perspective of social entrepreneurship. Respectively, she examines supportive legal frameworks and tailor-made legal forms for sustainable social enterprises in European countries. 
            
Her research focuses on four specific countries of interest i.e. Greece, Belgium, UK, and ultimately in the Netherlands by employing (i) comparative legal research and (ii) the empirical investigation of the implementation of legislation via the development of case studies of social enterprises. The empirical research examines particularly corporate governance models of social enterprises in the four research countries, as multi-actor and multi-stakeholder structures as well as the means of stakeholder engagement and sustainable management employed by social enterprises in the form of participatory and inclusive governance. 
                  
Among the developed case studies, empirical research is conducted by Aikaterini Argyrou in the Netherlands on social enterprises with environmental objectives which aim to the protection of the right to water, e.g. Dopper BV as well as on social enterprises with objectives which are affiliated to the protection of human rights e.g. Tony Chocolonely. This research project is set up by Nyenrode Business Universiteit together with Utrecht University.
                    
She also participates in the conduct of empirical studies and surveys in the Netherlands regarding desired legal and tax regimes for social enterprises. Her research in the Netherlands also examines the possibilities for participation and inclusion of various types of stakeholders in decision-making processes of Dutch social enterprises in collaboration with Price Waterhouse Coopers NL and the platform Social Enterprises NL. 
              
In general, her research interests lie in the field of law and entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurship, sustainability issues of company law, corporate social responsibility, business and human rights, gender and social entrepreneurship.
            
Other positions
Aikaterini Argyrou is also a qualified corporate attorney and a member of the Athens Lawyer’s Bar Association since 2012. Prior to her Ph.D studies, she was involved in many CSR research projects implemented by Nyenrode Business Universiteit, Utrecht University as well as by international institutes. Among others the development of a series of books regarding CSR in Indonesia in collaboration with various Indonesian universities, the establishment of the ‘ACCESS’ CSR conflict management center by the Hague Utilities for Global Organisations (HUGO) Initiative and the World Legal Forum, and finally the development of the Good Governance Index Project by the Hague Institute of the Internationalisation of Law (HiiL). In the past she was also a trainee legal counsel of the Greek Embassy in The Hague and a trainee attorney for two Greek-based legal firms.