Chapter 6 constitutes the core proposition of this book, in which the regenerative strategy is explained. Jointly with the theoretical arguments, two main figures capture the main characteristics of this disruptive environmental strategy, which is composed of two main elements: (1) a disruptive technological solution capable of fighting against the climate emergency through pollution reversion, net zero and even net negative emissions, which constitutes the creation of positive environmental externalities; and (2) a new firm purpose, driven by a new ecological, ethical and moral value that we name ‘eco-emotional wealth’, guiding environmental performance and, finally, the achievement of systemic socioecological resilience. To do so, we advocate a new approach to stakeholder management including unconventional and fringe stakeholders, such as communities, governments, global citizenship, the natural environment and future generations, jointly with a new very long-term perspective.

Chapter 3 carries out a critical review of environmental strategies, from reactive postures, such as pollution control, to the most proactive and advanced ones, such as pollution prevention and product stewardship. In doing so, the literature review shows the main theoretical streams used to frame different environmental strategic positionings, such as the institutional theory, the natural resource-based view, a new stakeholder theory or the microfoundations of strategy. To carry out a critical review of existing typologies of environmental strategies, they are deconstructed into their main features and dimensions following two research traditions: strategy (defenders, prospectors, analysers and reactors) and innovation (exploitation, exploration and ambidexterity). We conclude that these conventional approaches can be catalogued as ‘business-as-usual’ environmental strategies and finally present a disruptive alternative called the regenerative strategy.

The first and introductory chapter explains the necessity of this book, in other words, why it should be read. Several questions arise to illustrate this: If climate emergency is the grand challenge, why is so difficult to address it? Is it technically feasible? Economically? Trying to address it, we frame the current climate emergency as an extreme case of the well-known phenomenon of ‘the tragedy of the commons’. As a potential solution, we introduce a new disruptive business model and environmental strategy called ‘regenerative’, characterised by two main elements: (1) cutting-edge climate science solutions (capturing and utilising atmospheric carbon dioxide capable of producing net zero and even net negative emissions or positive environmental externalities); and (2) firm purpose redefinition under a new ecological, ethical and moral paradigm. Finally, a brief description of the book’s contents is presented.

The second chapter analyses the response to the climate grand challenge by institutions, governments, business practice and academia. Since the 1980s, climate science has alerted us, with data and evidence, to the serious effects that human intervention is having on the climate. This grand challenge constitutes a global problem that can be plausibly addressed through coordinated and collaborative efforts at a planetary scale, requiring the involvement of governments, supranational institutions, companies and, of course, management academics. From a historical perspective, we introduce the reader to how climate change was initially treated by multinational institutions and governments, and then we delve into the reaction of industry to this evidence, paying special attention to the fossil fuel industry because of its prominent role in the generation of greenhouse gases. Finally, we analyse the role of academia in addressing this challenge, in particular the role of organisations and the natural environment academics.

In the final chapter, readers find a brief review of the main contents that have been covered in the book. Jointly with that, there is a series of reflections derived from everything we have discussed throughout the text, such as the key role played by business education and the entrepreneurial action of governments in the fight against the climate emergency. In accordance with a more humanist management proposal and a greater awareness of the organisations–natural environment relationship, we highlight the educational proposals that stand out for presenting the new management values that this book aims to highlight and that begin by redefining the company's internal mission of regenerative strategy. The chapter ends with a brief reflection on the role that the entrepreneurial state must play in the definitive boost of the technologies that can help us face the climate emergency, not only by supporting companies and solving market failures, but also by creating markets and taking risks that no other agent is willing to bear. From our perspective, the climate emergency calls for it.

A Military Disaster?

In a ground-breaking article published in 1980, Cheynet pondered whether Manzikert was “un désastre militaire.” Since then, the consensus among historians of the period has been that Manzikert was not a military disaster and that the imperial army seems to have escaped relatively unscathed from the day's fighting on August 26, 1071, with the political and socio-economic consequences of the defeat far outweighing the losses the empire sustained on the battlefield. The rearguard and reserve units of “the tagma of the Hetairiae and that of the nobles” under Andronikos Doukas certainly escaped back to the capital without suffering any casualties, whilst Bryennius's left wing, which included the five western tagmata also escaped with relatively few losses; these units are reported defending the Balkans against the Patzinaks in the following years. Concerning the units of the right wing under Alyates, and especially the Armenian and Kappadokian forces, the sources tell us that a significant number of them managed to make an orderly escape to Trapezounta, Theodosiopolis, and Dokeia. According to Attaleiates, the units under Alyates reportedly pledged their allegiance to the emperor after his release from Turkish captivity.

Furthermore, what is notable is that the prominent men who were reported to have died in the battle were few and relatively unknown figures (Leon, who was epi ton deeseon and the magistros and protoasecretis Eustratios Choirosphaktes), while even fewer were captured alive (the protovestes Basileios Maleses and Nikephoros Basilakes, the latter having been taken prisoner the day before the main battle).5 If we add the elite units of Trachaneiotes and Roussel, which retreated to Melitene before the battle, a significant number of perhaps even twenty thousand men, it seems clear that the actual losses incurred during the battle were limited to the Diogenes's immediate retinue, the Armenian infantry, and the palatine and other elite units close to him, around five to ten percent of the campaigning army.

Military Demography

For military history, the problem of assessing the size and make up of armies is of critical importance, and the question “how big was an army?” echoes in the mind of any historian interested in the history of war. This “million dollar” question has stirred up such a heated debate within the academic community in the last century that historians should tread with caution when referring to issues of military demography. Therefore, it is my intention here to assess the various factors that would have affected the army estimates of the primary sources for the Battle of Manzikert, and to explain to what extent the figures they provide for army sizes are reliable, both in absolute numbers and in the ratios given between mounted and dismounted troops.

In terms of how contemporary historians obtained their numbers, we may consider two broad categories: first, those who had no access to official reports and data because of their position in society and/or because of any secrecy act/policy by the state; and second, those who did have access to official reports and data, and therefore provided numbers based either on military reviews or on regulations or custom. To begin with, the accounts of historians belonging to the first category would have been affected by three factors, depending on whether they were eyewitness to the events they describe. The first factor relates to the time when their work was written, and the reliance on oral testimonies by the historians. Such accounts always bore the risk of inflation and/or miscalculation. We should also consider that memories inevitably focus on the outcome and significant incidents. In fact, Thucydides observes that battles are difficult enough to reconstruct because each witnesses only knows what is happening in their immediate vicinity. This becomes more acute the lower an eyewitnesses was in the military hierarchy and, as a result, would have had a limited opportunity both to observe and to grasp the reality on the battlefield, which could provide us with a distorted picture of the day's events (although not always).

Chaos in the Camp

Because he was present in the fortified Byzantine camp, Michael Attaleiates was able to offer a highly emotional personal account of the unfolding disaster, as he experienced it through what he saw and what he heard from the soldiers who fled from the battlefield.1 There is a mixture of feelings in Attaleiates's account; panic and confusion about how the events unfolded, and uncertainty over who to ask for information: “Meanwhile, the flight of the others had led them to cluster outside the camp palisade and all were shout-ing incoherently and running about in disorder; nobody could say what exactly was going on.” Critically for Attaleiates, the fate of the emperor was of utmost importance, hence we read the contradicting reports that he received throughout Friday afternoon, “some claimed that the emperor was firmly resisting with what was left of his army and that he had routed the barbarians. Others said that he had been killed or captured. Everyone had something different to report, claiming victory for each side and then alternately denying it.”

Tthere was the growing awareness of the outcome of the battle, coupled with Atta-leiates's desperate attempts to avert the unfolding disaster by trying to convince some of the retreating soldiers to return to their posts, like in the aftermath of the desertion of some of the Oghuz on Thursday (August 25): “Finally, many of the Kappadokians who were with the emperor, one group after another, began to desert. Whether I myself was trying to stop many of the soldiers from running away and getting them to return to their posts to save us from defeat, I leave it to others to report.”

It was when Attaleiates had finally accepted that everything was lost, and a feeling of sadness and desperation set in that we read his harrowing words about the fate of the emperor and his army. There are reports of the Turks seizing and looting the imperial camp, but the loss of prestige was far harder to bear: