Government plays crucial roles in addressing and acting on the green transition and grand societal challenges more broadly. One of these roles is to make private businesses responsible and accountable for sustainable development through public policy. But what about government’s ability to make itself and the public sector responsible and accountable for green actions and outcomes? Based on the case of Denmark, this blog post argues that the self-responsibililization of government and the public sector calls for closer scrutiny as it tends to be characterized by decoupling and lack of clearly defined ownership and accountability regarding the green transition.
CSR
Strategies of Sustainability Communication
Corporate sustainability communication is becoming more sophisticated. This does not imply that such communication has become more truthful or more efficient in attaining its goals. What it means is that corporate communicators have become more aware of the dynamics at play when publicly announcing their sustainability ideals and aspirations. Taking a point of departure in a recent campaign from Apple, this blog post provides a glimpse into the strategic concerns, hopes and practices of contemporary corporate communicators. Understanding these concerns, hopes and practices can help us appreciate how communication and sustainability practices are related.
Corporate responsibility is back. It is about time…
If like me, you are following how private organisations are communicating about their work with their social and environmental impact, you certainly have noticed that they never have been short of buzzwords. As confusing as they may be, these buzzwords show an interesting dynamic of changing concepts and new trends and priorities for companies.
The Taxonomy, CSRD, ESRS – Let’s Not Make it a Numbers Game
Europe’s new sustainability regulations such as the Taxonomy and CSRD come with a risk: they may turn corporate sustainability into a “numbers game” with compliance being the main (and sometimes only) goal. We risk ending up with lots of reporting but too little actions. European companies face a wave of sustainability regulations, most notably the […]
Are we asking the wrong questions in corporate social responsibility (CSR) research?
The sustainability contributions of business are under increased scrutiny in society. Observations of greenwashing, blue-washing, corporate hypocrisy, and decoupling suggest the existence of an intentional or unintentional gap between espoused CSR strategies and actual sustainability outcomes at the societal level. In other words, there seems to be more “talking” than “walking”. This has inspired a growing concern […]
Corporate democratic responsibility – messy and difficult, yet urgent and without alternative
We live in politically tumultuous times. Authoritarianism is on the rise again across the world. Democratic freedoms have been in decline for 15 years in a row. The share of people living in free societies has shrunk to a meagre 14% of the world population. Meanwhile polarisation and populism, disinformation, mistrust and rising inequality have begun […]
Responsible to whom and for what? Contestations of CSR across time, space, and experience
It is well known that globalization of business has thrown up a host of new governance challenges and new governance solutions. Conspicuous in this regard are the various ‘responsibility remedies’ for challenges posed in the supply chains of multinational corporations. The growth and transformation of supply chains, particularly in agricultural products and garments has reflected a […]
Marching toward the end of enlightenment?
In the scholarly field of management and organization studies, which is traditionally primarily concerned with business firms and their performance, we can lately observe an increasing attention toward addressing some of the most pressing societal challenges of our times, such as climate change, pandemics, inequalities, etc.
The Uberization of corporate political action
With more than USD 12 billion spent the 2020 US election cycle may well have been the most expensive political campaign in the world so far. Yet in the shadows of this epic political contest another campaign unfolded that in my view provides some really interesting early signals on emerging trends in corporate political activity. Alongside the […]
Making Corporate Sustainability More Sustainable
For too many firms corporate sustainability is itself not a sustainable endeavor. Corporate sustainability initiatives are blossoming around the world. While some firms have built robust infrastructures around their efforts, other firms struggle to do so, making their engagement a short-lived endeavor. In other words, corporate sustainability is itself often not sustainable enough to create […]