As representações sociais dos gestores do Centro de Humanidades e o Plano de Logística Sustentável da Universidade Federal do Ceará

Abstract

Sustainability, understood as a multidimensional concept, has occupied a central position in academic and institutional debate, especially in Brazilian public universities, recognized as strategic agents in promoting the 2030 Agenda. In this context, social representations are a relevant interpretive key to understanding how university managers attribute meanings and operationalize institutional policies aimed at sustainable development. The Federal University of Ceará (UFC), through its Institutional Development Plan (PDI 2023–2027) and Sustainable Logistics Plan (PLS 2025–2027), explicitly states this commitment, with emphasis on the educational goals set out in Axis 6 of the PLS. In this context, the general objective of this study is to analyze how the social representations of technical-administrative staff and faculty who perform management functions at the Center for Humanities (CH) contribute to the fulfillment of the goals of that axis. This is a qualitative research study, developed as a case study, based on Social Representation Theory. Data collection was carried out through semi-structured interviews, whose corpus was analyzed with the aid of IRaMuTeq (Interface de R pour les Analyses Multidimensionnelles de Textes et de Questionnaires) software, using Descending Hierarchical Classification. The results indicate that sustainability is a social object under construction, marked by heterogeneous representations that oscillate between broad conceptual understandings, intuitive resource management practices, and perceptions of institutional limitations. There is a clear lack of knowledge of the PLS among managers, which weakens its symbolic circulation and hinders its appropriation as an institutional guideline. Although there are daily actions that are occasionally aligned with the goals of Axis 6, these mainly result from individual initiatives rather than systematic training or awareness-raising processes. It is concluded that the achievement of the goals of Axis 6 depends on the strengthening of institutional strategies for communication, training, and governance, capable of consolidating the educational dimension of sustainability at the university and expanding the integration between institutional policies and management practices within the scope of the UFC Humanities Center.