Sustainable Development: Epistemological Frameworks & an Ethic of Choice

Abstract

As the second part of a research agenda addressing the idea and meaning of Sustainable Development, this paper responds to the challenges set in the first paper. Using a Foucaudian perspective, we uncover and highlight the importance of discourse in the development of societal context which could lead to the radical change in our epistemological thought necessary for Sustainable Development to reach its potential. By developing an argument for an epistemological change, we suggest that business organizations have an ethical responsibility towards revaluating Sustainable Development, leading to a discourse based on an integrated inclusive process of celebrating diversity in all its forms. The paper goes on to explore the argument for such a change. This exploration is based on three issues: the notion of over simplification in the promotion of development; the idea of an imbalance in the interaction of business and government operating in the larger context of society; and the notion of increasing responsibility with increasing influence in terms of the business organization within society. Having established the argument for an ethical choice by business organizations, we then reflect on how such a change could be incorporated into an organization.

Living downwind from corporate social responsibility: a community perspective on corporate practice

“…Within the CSR field, this has led to the legitimising of exclusive ways of thinking about CSR and the prevention of a critical debate (Blowfield 2005a) as dissenting viewpoints are discredited and rejected. The closedness of economic rationality (Dryzek 1996, Hamilton 2002, Ö zel 2002, Fergus & Rowney 2005 potentially renders an economically underpinned CSR theory ineffective to address the very social dilemmas it is meant to solve because its underlying reductionism only lends itself poorly to a complete understanding of the CSR problematic. As a result, critical structural and procedural aspects of industrycommunity conflicts as they relate to issues such as power and stakeholder dissent tend to be overlooked and to fall outside the realm of critical analysis.…”

The Precautionary Principle as a Framework for a Sustainable Information Society

“…involving stakeholders in a dialogue on the development and application of novel technologies. It is known to aid in detecting early warnings, assessing technical alternatives, preventing conflicts and developing safer products (Fergus and Rowney, 2005;Jeurissen, 2004;WBGU, 1998).…”

Corporate social responsibility and green management

“…Many of these authors focus the discussion on the position adopted by companies that face the sustainable development issues. Fergus and Rowney (2005) affirm that organizations have a responsibility to do more than "satisfy" the customer's or the society's needs. They need to act to change these values and to create new needs along with those new values.…”

“…Interviewee A9 remarks on this role of change agent that the Brazilian Subsidiary has to attempted (acting to change values as suggested by Fergus and Rowney, 2005):…”