Corporate Sustainability
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Abstract
Dyllick and Hockerts observed that consideration and debate regarding sustainability in the 21 st century has involved integrating long-standing concerns about economic growth and social equity with concern for the carrying capacity of natural systems. 1 In their words, sustainability “embodies the promise of societal evolution towards a more equitable and wealthy world in which the natural environment and our cultural achievements are preserved for generations to come”. Simply put, problems relating to economic growth, social equity and the environment must be addressed and solved simultaneously. 2 Emerging from all this has been the drive for “sustainable development” that has led to international treaties relating to the protection of biodiversity and climate change and governmental programs focusing on national and local sustainability. In addition, sustainable development has been adopted at the firm level as companies have accepted “corporate sustainability” as a precondition for doing business, integrated sustainability into their governance structures by appointing corporate sustainability officers, published sustainability reports and incorporated sustainability into their communication strategies. 3 However, while Dyllick and Hockerts were encouraged that companies and their managers were accepting responsibility for the environmental and social impacts of their actions, they argued that most companies had opted for “eco-efficiency” as their guiding principle for sustainability and that as a sole concept this was insufficient and needed to be broadened to include other corporate sustainability criteria included in the framework described below.