This is an article I have re-read many times. Each time I return to it I pick up a different idea or new perspective. This time around, the article drew my attention to the challenge it makes to the central focus of consumption within the capitalist model that has evolved in the West (Issues: Environmental Sustainability, p171):
“It is based on appetite, consumption and waste; they are not by-products but driving forces.”
Because waste is inherent to economic growth—it prefers us to replace our cars every three years rather than ten and to buy disposable products rather than ones we can re-use—and because resources are finite, it is essential that we learn to re-cycle more effectively in order for our current economic system to remain sustainable in the long run. Some CSR advocates see this fault in our economic model and call for a revolution. Strategic CSR, on the other hand, seeks to reform the system we have so that capitalism works to maximize both economic and social progress.
Take care
Dave
Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility
© Sage Publications, 2006
http://www.sagepub.com/Werther/
The Prince and the great debate
Charles: right or wrong about science?
Andrew Marr welcomes the Prince's promotion of spiritual values and argues that, unwittingly or not, Charles has hit the key issue: money and markets
Sunday May 21, 2000
The Observer
http://www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2000/may/21/focus.news
