IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/envira/v49y2017i8p1824-1845.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Fields of green: Corporate sustainability and the production of economistic environmental governance

Author

Listed:
  • Peter R Wilshusen
  • Kenneth Iain MacDonald

Abstract

This article critically examines the production of economistic fields of environmental governance in the context of global summits like Rio + 20. It focuses on the constitutive work performed by diverse actors in extending corporate sustainability logics, social technologies, and organizational forms initially enacted at the 2012 Corporate Sustainability Forum (CSF). Fields are defined as dynamic, relational arenas featuring particular logics, dynamic actor positions, and organizational forms. Corporate sustainability exemplifies how the language and practices of economics have reshaped approaches to environmental protection and sustainable development. Although numerous studies have looked at the implementation of market-oriented approaches, less attention has been focused on the constitutive processes that animate and expand economistic fields of governance over time. Our analysis emphasizes diffuse processes of economization as central to the reproduction and extension of fields. The article addresses three key issues: (1) how global corporate sustainability networks help to constitute economistic fields of governance, (2) the extent to which major events contribute to field configuration, and (3) the processes through which field elements—logics, social technologies, and organizational forms—transpose onto related fields of governance. Field configuration produces economistic environmental governance by solidifying business logics, enabling new actor-networks, launching new global-scale initiatives, and enhancing the role of UN agencies in promoting corporate sustainability. We illustrate field configuration with two examples: the Natural Capital Declaration and the Green Industry Platform. Our analysis highlights the diffuse power of field dynamics in which discursive and social entanglement and transposition reproduce and extend corporate sustainability beyond current institutional boundaries.

Suggested Citation

  • Peter R Wilshusen & Kenneth Iain MacDonald, 2017. "Fields of green: Corporate sustainability and the production of economistic environmental governance," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 49(8), pages 1824-1845, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:envira:v:49:y:2017:i:8:p:1824-1845
    DOI: 10.1177/0308518X17705657
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0308518X17705657
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0308518X17705657?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dan Brockington, 2012. "A Radically Conservative Vision? The Challenge of UNEP's Towards a Green Economy," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 43(1), pages 409-422, January.
    2. Anonymous, 2013. "Introduction to the Issue," Journal of Wine Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 8(3), pages 243-243, December.
    3. N. Anand & Brittany C. Jones, 2008. "Tournament Rituals, Category Dynamics, and Field Configuration: The Case of the Booker Prize," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(6), pages 1036-1060, September.
    4. Anonymous, 2013. "Introduction to the Issue," Journal of Wine Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 8(2), pages 129-130, November.
    5. Lisa M. Campbell & Catherine Corson & Noella J. Gray & Kenneth I. MacDonald & Peter Brosius, 2014. "Introduction: Studying Global Environmental Meetings to Understand Global Environmental Governance: Collaborative Event Ethnography at the Tenth Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biologic," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 14(3), pages 1-20, August.
    6. George Holmes, 2011. "Conservation's Friends in High Places: Neoliberalism, Networks, and the Transnational Conservation Elite," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 11(4), pages 1-21, November.
    7. Lisa M. Campbell & Shannon Hagerman & Noella J. Gray, 2014. "Producing Targets for Conservation: Science and Politics at the Tenth Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 14(3), pages 41-63, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Wilshusen, Peter R., 2019. "Environmental governance in motion: Practices of assemblage and the political performativity of economistic conservation," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 1-1.
    2. Alessandro Lai & Silvia Panfilo & Riccardo Stacchezzini, 2019. "The governmentality of corporate (un)sustainability: the case of the ILVA steel plant in Taranto (Italy)," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 23(1), pages 67-109, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ranjana Raghunathan, 2022. "Everyday Intimacies and Inter-Ethnic Relationships: Tracing Entanglements of Gender and Race in Multicultural Singapore," Sociological Research Online, , vol. 27(1), pages 77-94, March.
    2. Balint, T. & Lamperti, F. & Mandel, A. & Napoletano, M. & Roventini, A. & Sapio, A., 2017. "Complexity and the Economics of Climate Change: A Survey and a Look Forward," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 138(C), pages 252-265.
    3. Lamperti, Francesco & Bosetti, Valentina & Roventini, Andrea & Tavoni, Massimo & Treibich, Tania, 2021. "Three green financial policies to address climate risks," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 54(C).
    4. Songsore, Emmanuel & Buzzelli, Michael, 2014. "Social responses to wind energy development in Ontario: The influence of health risk perceptions and associated concerns," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 285-296.
    5. Tapsuwan, Sorada & Polyakov, Maksym & Bark, Rosalind & Nolan, Martin, 2015. "Valuing the Barmah–Millewa Forest and in stream river flows: A spatial heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent (SHAC) approach," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 98-105.
    6. Omar Al-Ubaydli & John List & Claire Mackevicius & Min Sok Lee & Dana Suskind, 2019. "How Can Experiments Play a Greater Role in Public Policy? 12 Proposals from an Economic Model of Scaling," Artefactual Field Experiments 00679, The Field Experiments Website.
    7. Nepomuceno, Marcelo Vinhal & Laroche, Michel, 2015. "The impact of materialism and anti-consumption lifestyles on personal debt and account balances," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 68(3), pages 654-664.
    8. Bertschek, Irene & Kesler, Reinhold, 2022. "Let the user speak: Is feedback on Facebook a source of firms’ innovation?," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    9. Avelino, Flor & Wittmayer, Julia M. & Pel, Bonno & Weaver, Paul & Dumitru, Adina & Haxeltine, Alex & Kemp, René & Jørgensen, Michael S. & Bauler, Tom & Ruijsink, Saskia & O'Riordan, Tim, 2019. "Transformative social innovation and (dis)empowerment," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 195-206.
    10. Gigi Foster, 2020. "The behavioural economics of government responses to COVID-19," Journal of Behavioral Economics for Policy, Society for the Advancement of Behavioral Economics (SABE), vol. 4(S3), pages 11-43, December.
    11. Audoly, Richard & Vogt-Schilb, Adrien & Guivarch, Céline & Pfeiffer, Alexander, 2018. "Pathways toward zero-carbon electricity required for climate stabilization," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 225(C), pages 884-901.
    12. Gerards, Ruud & Welters, Ricardo, 2016. "Impact of financial pressure on unemployed job search, job find success and job quality," ROA Research Memorandum 008, Maastricht University, Research Centre for Education and the Labour Market (ROA).
    13. Cairns, George & Wright, George & Fairbrother, Peter, 2016. "Promoting articulated action from diverse stakeholders in response to public policy scenarios: A case analysis of the use of ‘scenario improvisation’ method," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 97-108.
    14. Vasile-Daniel Păvăloaia & Elena-Mădălina Teodor & Doina Fotache & Magdalena Danileţ, 2019. "Opinion Mining on Social Media Data: Sentiment Analysis of User Preferences," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(16), pages 1-21, August.
    15. Cailong Xu & Ruidong Li & Wenwen Song & Tingting Wu & Shi Sun & Shuixiu Hu & Tianfu Han & Cunxiang Wu, 2021. "Responses of Branch Number and Yield Component of Soybean Cultivars Tested in Different Planting Densities," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 11(1), pages 1-12, January.
    16. Romaniuk, Jenni & Nenycz-Thiel, Magda, 2016. "Lapsed buyers' durable brand consideration in emerging markets," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(9), pages 3645-3651.
    17. Caitlin Robinson & Stefan Bouzarovski & Sarah Lindley, 2018. "Underrepresenting neighbourhood vulnerabilities? The measurement of fuel poverty in England," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 50(5), pages 1109-1127, August.
    18. Michaela Haase & Emmanuel Raufflet, 2017. "Ideologies in Markets, Organizations, and Business Ethics: Drafting a Map: Introduction to the Special Issue," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 142(4), pages 629-639, June.
    19. Rafael Alcadipani & Cíntia Rodrigues Oliveira Medeiros, 2020. "When Corporations Cause Harm: A Critical View of Corporate Social Irresponsibility and Corporate Crimes," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 167(2), pages 285-297, November.
    20. Mansoora Ahmed & Sun Zehou & Syed Ali Raza & Muhammad Asif Qureshi & Sara Qamar Yousufi, 2020. "Impact of CSR and environmental triggers on employee green behavior: The mediating effect of employee well‐being," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 27(5), pages 2225-2239, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:envira:v:49:y:2017:i:8:p:1824-1845. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.