The Corporation is Ailing Social Technology: Creating a ‘Fit for Purpose’ Design for Sustainability

Designed to facilitate economic development, the corporate form now threatens human survival. This article presents an argument that organisations are yet to be ??fit for purpose?? and that the corporate form needs to be re-designed to reach sustainability. It suggests that organisations need to recognise their agent status amongst a much wider and highly complex array of interconnected, dynamic economic, environmental and social systems. Human Factors theory is drawn on to propose that business systems could be made sustainable through re-design. They could fit their environment more appropriately by improving: Efficiency, Adaptability and Social Cohesion. Leaders of organisations would also need to take a holistic approach to alter the organisation proactively to adapt to the systems within which it is embedded.     

‘From a mother to another’: creative experiences of sharing used children’s clothing

ABSTRACT

This paper explores how consumers deliberate and incorporate concerns for sustainability in their consumption behaviours, through the lens of children’s clothing provisioning. Frustrated by the limited acknowledgement for sustainable issues within the UK mass market fashion retail sector, the participants reveal engaging with social innovation exchange initiatives, including networks of used children’s clothing. The research is informed by 28 professionally working mothers who navigate between meeting the social needs of themselves and their family with their growing knowledge for sustainability. The networks are symbolic of shared social values and building supportive communities that provided emotional and practical pathways for family provisioning. The research illustrates how societal discourse around sustainability is growing and how alternative market structures provide routes that appeal to consumers practically, socially and ideologically. Moreover, the research contributes to understanding opportunities that advance the sustainability agenda, for marketing, social innovation initiatives and progressing sustainable businesses.     

Which Dimension of Corporate Social Responsibility is a Value Driver in the Oil and Gas Industry?

The oil and gas (O&G) industry suffers from a negative perception of poor sustainability. O&G companies are therefore engaged in several socially sustainable activities related to community development and environmental protection. This article determines whether the social, environmental, and economic dimensions of corporate social responsibility (CSR) are equally value‐additive to O&G companies. We measure the company‐specific level of CSR activities from the information provided in the annual financial reports of O&G companies and determine the effects of CSR dimensions on firm value. We find that CSR enhances firm value of O&G companies. While social activities such as employee well‐being and community development are key value‐drivers, environmental and economic sustainable activities have an insignificant impact on the market value of O&G companies. Copyright © 2018 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd     

Bridging the gap: How sustainable development can help companies create shareholder value and improve financial performance

This study examines the effect of integrating sustainability into corporate strategy on various aspects of shareholder value creation and financial performance in the British capital market. The employed method is based on the content analysis of corporate disclosures and a new technique for assessing the adoption of the corporate sustainability concept (embracing the environmental, social, and financial aspects of a company's policies at the same time). Using extensive data of FTSE 350 firms covering the years 2006–2012, 65 companies were selected as meeting corporate sustainability criteria. For the above period, we find that these firms were characterized by higher financial risk exposure, lower asset growth rates, lower BV/MV ratios, lower EVA ratios, and higher MVA ratios. Such relations were generally present among different size and industry groupings. The results support the thesis that firms that incorporate sustainability issues into their business operations are better able to leverage their resources toward stronger financial performance and shareholder value creation than other companies. The paper contributes to the literature by offering a more holistic approach to corporate sustainable performance measurement and shedding additional light on its relation to financial performance in the context of the recent global financial crisis and its direct aftermath.     

Sustainability seen from the perspective of consumers

An important step in promoting sustainable consumption is to find out how consumers understand the concept of sustainability. In this paper, we report on a study among Norwegian consumers in which we explored their understanding of sustainability at two levels. First, we investigated consumers' understanding of the general sustainability concept; specifically, we studied how important the following five sustainability dimensions are in consumers' conception of sustainability: the environmental, social, economic, temporal and the developmental dimension. Second, we investigated how consumers' understanding of sustainability manifests itself in consumption decisions: We studied consumers' opinions about how important various attributes are for sustainable products and which product labels they consider indicative of sustainable products. We found that all five sustainability dimensions occurred as elements of consumers' understanding of the sustainability concept. The environmental dimension, the social dimension and the developmental dimension were particularly outstanding. With regard to attributes that are important for sustainable products, consumers placed high emphasis on recyclability of the packaging, fair payment of producers, low energy use and low carbon dioxide emissions during production and shipping. Humane animal treatment was also considered an important attribute of sustainable products. The product labels that were considered most indicative of sustainable products were the Nordic Swan and the Norwegian Debio label. Consumers' judgments of how indicative the labels are of sustainable products were related positively to familiarity with the labels.     

Compassion without action: Examining the young consumers consumption and attitude to sustainable consumption

The concept of developing sustainable consumption practices has been a factor for discussion within academic literature for nearly half a decade. Many have argued the consequences of unmonitored consumption practices within a ‘throw-away’ society would lead to environmental, social and economic degeneration. With consumption no longer hindered by global boundaries, there is an emergence of a common class of people within society consuming in vast amounts, over great distances from one another, and reaps irreparable environmental damage. The onus of developing sustainable practice is no longer the sole responsibility of economies of affluence and specific segments of our economy but has become the responsibility of all stakeholders. Using a triangulated qualitative approach, the aim of this research is to advance our understanding and definition of sustainability in the key stakeholder group: The young consumers, Y generation. The research will focus on understanding their consumption footprints and their view of the notion of sustainability. Implications for social changes, policy and practice will also be presented.     

Cross‐sector alliances in the global refugee crisis: An institutional theory approach

The global refugee crisis has posed severe challenges to social stability and sustainable development around the world. While the business sector is expected to shoulder social responsibility in crisis relief efforts, our initial assessment shows that refugee‐related corporate social responsibility (CSR) significantly diverged across the Global Fortune 500 corporations. To advance scholars and managers' understanding of this complex CSR issue, this study draws upon National Business System Theory to explore how country‐level factors influence the multinational corporations' CSR communication about the refugee issue. Specifically, the study focuses on the strategic cross‐sector alliances between corporations, NGOs, and IGOs. The analysis shows that in this controversial global crisis, the following factors of corporations' countries‐of‐origin can significantly affect the level of cross‐sector CSR alliances: democracy levels, economic inequality levels, and unemployment rates. Findings of this study provide practical guidelines that can help managers to anticipate societal expectations when dealing with controversial social issues in an international setting. Our findings could also assist policymakers, NGOs, and IGOs to better design strategies to mobilize the corporate resources.     

The Precautionary Principle as a Framework for a Sustainable Information Society

The precautionary principle (PP) aims to anticipate and minimize potentially serious or irreversible risks under conditions of scientific uncertainty. Thus it preserves the potential for future developments. It has been incorporated into many international treaties and pieces of national legislation for environmental protection and sustainable development. In this article, we outline an interpretation of the PP as a framework of orientation for a sustainable information society. Since the risks induced by future information and communication technologies (ICT) are social risks for the most part, we propose to extend the PP from mainly environmental to social subjects of protection. From an ethical point of view, the PP and sustainability share the principle of intergenerational justice, which can be used as an argument to preserve free space for the decisions of future generations. Applied to technical innovation and to ICT issues in particular, the extended PP can serve as a framework of orientation to avoid socio-economically irreversible developments. We conclude that the PP is a useful approach for: (i) policy makers to reconcile information society and sustainability policies and (ii) ICT companies to formulate sustainability strategies.     

International Service Learning as Social Value Cocreation

International Service Learning (ISL) is a growing trend in higher education in which students have the opportunity to earn academic credit while participating in community-based service projects. This growth represents an opportunity for NGOs to generate resources for their organization to pursue their mission and generate broader social value. The present work adopts a service dominant logic (SD Logic; Vargo & Lusch, 2004) perspective of value cocreation to highlight the exchange that occurs on two ISL programs based in sub-Saharan Africa. We find that the process of critical reflection on personal fulfillment and social justice serves as the vehicle to create change in (and value for) the program participants. NGOs gain a range of resources including financial, human, intellectual, and social capital through creating this ISL experience with consumers. The current work illustrates how ISL is an opportunity for NGOs to further their mission and serves as a means of sustainable social change.     

Leadership for Sustainability: An Evolution of Leadership Ability

This article examines the existing confusion over the multiple leadership styles related to successful implementation of corporate social responsibility/sustainability in organisations. The researchers find that the problem is the complex nature of sustainability itself. We posit that organisations are complex adaptive systems operating within wider complex adaptive systems, making the problem of interpreting just in what way an organisation is to be sustainable, an extraordinary demand on leaders. Hence, leadership for sustainability requires leaders of extraordinary abilities. These are leaders who can read and predict through complexity, think through complex problems, engage groups in dynamic adaptive organisational change and have the emotional intelligence to adaptively engage with their own emotions associated with complex problem solving. Leaders and leadership is a key interpreter of how sustainability of the organisation ‘links’ to the wider systems in which the organisation sits, and executing that link well requires unusual leaders and leadership systems.     

Integrating Behavioral Decision Theory and Sustainable Supply Chain Management: Prioritizing Economic,Environmental, and Social Dimensions in Carrier Selection

Carrier selection is a specialized sourcing decision with sustainability impacts in every supply chain. This research tests the effects of a transportation carrier's economic, environmental, and social sustainability performance on a shipper's carrier selection decision. Underrepresented experimental methods are used to test an a priori hypothesis derived from behavioral decision theory logic. Results contradict commonly held win–win, trade‐off, and ecological perspectives of sustainable supply chain management by finding that the economic dimension of sustainability has the greatest effect on carrier selection. Our research highlights this managerial preference and offers a theoretically grounded explanation for selection behaviors. This is one of the first empirical studies to simultaneously consider all three dimensions of sustainability. It also moves beyond an internal focal firm focus to evaluate sustainability effects through the eyes of external supply chain members. Our unique approach and findings offer managerial opportunities for differentiation and resource allocation as well as policy implications for the broader transportation system.     

A Review of Sustainable Supply Chain Management Practices in Canada

There is a growing body of research on the theory and practice of sustainable supply chain management (SSCM). However, relatively little research has been conducted on the extent to which corporations have integrated sustainability principles into the management of their supply chain and the evaluation of supplier performance. The purpose of this article is to explore the extent to which corporate sustainability principles are integrated into supply chain management (SCM) in corporations. Canada is used as a case study in this article. The study included a content analysis of one hundred Canadian corporate sustainable development reports and in-depth interviews with 18 Canadian experts on SSCM. The article highlights the wide array of ways in which Canadian corporations address SSCM issues. Amongst other topics, issues associated with supply chain governance, standards for SSCM, collaboration with suppliers, performance measurement, and accountability within the supply chain are explored. The findings reveal that there are many challenges in integrating sustainability into SCM. These challenges shed light on possible future directions for research in SSCM. This article underlines the need for research that reflects the interconnected nature of the economic, environmental, and social dimensions of sustainability, particularly as it relates to measuring supplier performance on sustainability initiatives.     

Towards a More ‘Ethically Correct’ Governance for Economic Sustainability

In this paper, we propose that economic sustainability is seen in terms of (inter-temporal and inter-national) value creation. We claim that value appropriation (or capture), can become a constraint to economic sustainability. We propose that for sustainable value creation to be fostered, corporate governance needs to be aligned to public and supra-national governance. In order to achieve this, a hierarchically layered set of ‘agencies’, needs to be diagnosed and the issue of incentive alignment addressed. Enlightened self-interest, pluralism and diversity, as well as a representative supra-national organisation for world-wide economic sustainability can serve as a new, more ‘ethically correct’ governance for economic sustainability, but not a panacea.     

Beyond the Bounded Instrumentality in Current Corporate Sustainability Research: Toward an Inclusive Notion of Profitability

We argue that the majority of the current approaches in research on corporate sustainability are inconsistent with the notion of sustainable development. By defining the notion of instrumentality in the context of corporate sustainability through three conceptual principles we show that current approaches are rooted in a bounded notion of instrumentality which establishes a systematic a priori predominance of economic organizational outcomes over environmental and social aspects. We propose an inclusive notion of profitability that reflects the return on all forms of environmental, social, and economic capital used by a firm. This inclusive notion of corporate profitability helps to redefine corporate profitability as if sustainability matters in that it overcomes the bounded instrumentality that impairs current research on corporate sustainability. We apply this notion to different car manufacturers and develop conceptual implications for future research on corporate sustainability.     

企业环境行为与企业价值相关关系研究

近年来,经济的迅速发展带来越来越严重的环境问题,社会各界逐渐认识到保护环境的重要性。企业作为经济活动的基本组成单位,既是环境效益的最大受益者,也是环境质量的最大破坏者。因此,研究企业环境行为和企业价值之间的关系非常重要。本研究在总结国内外相关文献研究的基础上,以采矿业,造纸业,金属冶炼及压延加工业,电力、热力、燃气、水的生产和供应业的A股303家上市公司为样本,从上市公司2017年年报、社会责任报告、可持续发展报告和环境报告书中搜集整理得到环境行为相关数据,提出研究假设,选取“三废(废气、废水、废渣)”排放量、排污费、企业从政府获得的环保补助、环保设备等方面的投入以及上市公司及其子公司是否属于环境保护部门公布的重点排污单位五方面作为企业环境行为的代表变量,以企业价值作为被解释变量,引入控制变量有企业规模、第一大股东持股比例和净资产收益率,建立分析模型,对数据进行统计描述、相关性检验及回归分析,以验证假设是否成立。研究结论表明,“三废”排放量、环保补助、重点排污单位与企业价值相关关系不显著,排污费与企业所有者权益比值和企业价值负相关,环保投入与企业总资产的比值与企业价值正相关关系显著。企业规模与企业价值负相关关系显著。净资产收益率和企业价值正相关关系显著。第一大股东持股比例与企业价值之间的相关关系不显著。最后提出有针对性的若干建议。通过本文的研究希望可以促使更多企业提高环境管理水平,提升环境责任意识,实现可持续发展理念。     

Consuming apart,together: the role of multiple identities in sustainable behaviour

Although consumers’ awareness of the environmental and ethical consequences of their behaviour has grown, research on the role of multiple consumer identities in sustainability behaviours is scarce. The aim of the current study was to explain sustainable behaviour from a social identity perspective. We conducted a longitudinal cross‐national within‐subjects design consumer study in six countries (T1, N=3083; T2, N=1440). The results indicate that environmental sustainability can comprise several distinct yet overlapping sustainable behaviours. Multiple social identities seem to play different roles in these different behaviours. Therefore, efforts to enhance different sustainability behaviours are challenging yet promising. Once consumers incorporate a sustainable behaviour, it becomes part of their own identity and could lead to spill over effects on other closely related sustainable behaviours.     

Ethics in Nanotechnology: What’s Being Done? What’s Missing?

Nanotechnology shows great promise in a variety of applications with attractive economic and societal benefits. However, societal issues associated with nanotechnology are still a concern to the general public. While numerous technological advancements in nanotechnology have been achieved over the past decade, research into the broader societal issues of nanotechnology is still in its early phases. Based on the data from the Web of Science database, we applied the main path analysis, cluster analysis and text mining tools to explore the main research fronts and hierarchical structure of these societal issues. We found that the research studies fell into four categories: “General Toxicity and EHS (Environment, Health and Safety),” “Medicine and Cytotoxicity,” “Assessment and Regulation,” and “Environment and Ecotoxicity.” These research studies have disclosed much information about the potential effect of nanotechnology on public health and the environment. Relatively speaking, the studies on the assessment, regulation, preventive solutions, and environmental protection are just emerging. This finding indicates that an abundance of effort should be conducted on these emerging themes to maximize the benefits of nanotechnology while minimizing its potential harm. The implications for various parties in this domain are also presented.     

Nachhaltigkeit in Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft

The scientific advisory board of the federal ministry of economic affairs and climate protection conducted a symposium on sustainability at its 500th meeting. The UN’s sustainable development goals play an increasingly important role in economic policy and regulation. This article gives a survey of the trade-offs and implementation problems that were discussed at the symposium, in particular the operationalisation of sustainability in welfare economics, the implementation of sustainability goals in economic law, the relationship between competition policy and sustainability, the impact of sustainability concerns on monetary policy, and finally, supply chain regulation and sustainability objectives.