What to count and what NOT to count as sustainability impacts
Companies are assessed on their sustainability performance, either at organisation level or at product/service level. Sustainability is often used as a one-size-fits-all concept, with all kinds of meanings attached to it. Some say ‘anything as acceptable’, while other use it in a very restricted sense. Can we as scientists still give guidance on its definition, asks Walter Vermeulen in book chapter Substantiating the rough consensus on concept of sustainable development as point of departure for indicator development?
Claims about the vagueness of the term sustainability are the result of divergent ideas on what is needed for sustainable development. This has its roots in competing framings of the concept in the market arena, as well as the shared tendency to disagree within and between academic disciplines and in the political arena.
Vermeulen argues that, despite the condemnations of the vagueness of the concept of sustainable development, in practice we can see a rough consensus on what it includes. By systematically reviewing widely substantiated views in diverse academic and practitioner communities, we can create an integrated and accepted view. This review shows that one thing that cannot be counted is the inclusion of ‘profit’ in as a sustainability impact.
Vermeulen, W.J.V. (2018). Substantiating the rough consensus on concept of sustainable development as point of departure for indicator development. In Simon Bell & Stephen Morse (Eds.), Routledge Handbook of Sustainability Indicators (pp. 59-90) (31 p.). Routledge.