Designing a model for consumer green ethical decision-making in the clothing industry

Nowadays, in order to understand the behavior of consumers and producers, companies seek to create solutions to optimize their products in line with the environment, which shows the precise planning of green products in industries. In terms of method, this research is exploratory based on a mixed approach and in terms of purpose, it is practical. The data of the qualitative phase of the research was collected using semi-structured interviews with 17 experts, including business management professors and clothing industry activists who were selected in a purposeful way, and were analyzed with MAXQDA 2020 software, adopting a grounded-theory approach. The data in the quantitative stage were also analyzed using a questionnaire collected through non-probability sampling strategy among 374 customers of the garment industry, using SPSS 27 and SmartPLS3 software, informed by the partial least squares approach in structural equation modeling. The results of the present research led to the identification of six categories of strategies (government policy making, empowering the business environment), intervening factors (social relations, government policies), consequences (sustainable development in the country, increasing the strength and power of sellers and producers, improving the quality and quantity level of customers), background factors (individual and environmental factors), causal factors (internal and external factors), and consumer ethical decision-making (supporting national production, ethical decision-making approaches, avoiding extravagance and luxury, applied environmental ethics). These findings were also confirmed in the quantitative phase. It is necessary that all social units in the country, from the individual level to the government, focus on the need for green ethical decision-making so that this issue is reflected in consumers and producers.