One of the big challenges in any movement is whether to aim to be a broad or a narrow church. Should you form a tight bond with only those who perfectly agree with you, or link up with those who you share some overlap but far from perfect alignment? There is no universal answer to…
Search Results for: sustainability
What Type Of Green Are You?
Today I’m writing about a blog post. It seems a bit strange to blog about a blog but the classification it presents is very helpful and I’ve found many who don’t know about it. Alex Steffen’s classifications of people’s attitudes to environmental sustainability seeks to explain divides within the green community. So, what type of…
A Challenge With Managerial Articles
I’m a big fan of accessible research. People, rightly, get put off by a piece of work where the footnotes are longer than the main text. It is horrible to have your ability to concentrate on the ‘story’ that the researcher is trying to convey being constantly interrupted by intrusive footnotes. (The worst is when…
Do You Really Need A Dodgy Historical Example?
I initially trained as a historian (my Master of Arts is in Hellenistic Studies — the period just after Alexander the Great). As such, I’m fascinated by appeals to history to justify ideas in modern life. They can often be fun to read about; after all there are some great stories in history. The challenge…
Limits And Self-Limits
Giorgos Kallis, a proponent of Degrowth has a paper on limits. He links this to the work of Malthus (see here). Indeed, to my mind, one way to see Kallis’ work is an attempt to distance ecologists from Malthus. I don’t blame him for that aim. Kallis also investigates the nature of limits. He rejects…
Win-Wins Are Good For Stakeholders
A theme I see in some writing about sustainable business is that we need to get beyond win-wins. Although I get the point — business cases won’t deliver everything — I worry that this isn’t the right message. Win-wins are good for stakeholders, and we haven’t found all the win-wins yet. As such, I’m not…
Owners Often Care About Beer, Housing, God, And National Identity
Milton Friedman’s idea that owners of, and managers at, companies should only care about the owner’s wealth is pretty odd when you think about it. Owners have long cared about much more because they are human beings. A book on the Guinness family suggests owners often care about beer, housing, God, and national identity. What…
Q&A On Sustainable Business
What Is Sustainability? The most common definition is from a United Nations report, (Our Common Future, the Brundtland Report from 1987). This informally defines sustainability as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” (https://www.un.org/en/academic-impact/sustainability). Is Sustainable Just Green? Note that the idea of meeting…
Sustainable Business Reading List
Here is a Sustainable Business Reading List which covers books in sustainability and the sustainable business field. Note I am not recommending all these. Some of them I don’t like at all. (You will pick this up if you follow the links to my commentaries). Still, reading them helps give an idea of what discussions…
An Ineffective Defense Of Degrowth
One of the most interesting divides in the sustainability field is around degrowth. The idea of degrowth is hard for many business people to embrace. I must confess, as you will see, I find that the logic of the degrowth people often eludes me. As such, I was interested to see what Christopher Marquis had…
