Internal and external drivers push companies and entire industries towards actively embracing (more) sustainable business conduct. Until recently, striving towards sustainability has been predominantly conceived as a business case by practitioners and business scholars. This means that it was common to assume that achievements for corporate sustainability could be reached with a win-win-paradigm in mind. It was assumed that environmental and societal progress towards sustainability can be directly related to economic success. Recent research has cast serious doubts at the usefulness of this unidimensional business case thinking for guiding highly-complex transitions towards sustainable production and consumption patterns, which has refocused scholarly attention to the trade-offs, conflicts, paradoxes, dilemmas, or tensions that companies have to deal with on various levels when striving towards more sustainable business. The aim of this paper is to assess corporate tensions (and related research approaches) which companies face when embarking on their transition towards sustainability, i.e. when they strive to enhance their sustainability performance up to an ideal state as exemplified by the zero-impact concept. For this end, we carry out a content-analysis based systematic literature review of English-speaking peer-reviewed journal publications featuring research on corporate transition towards sustainability (2000-2017), following a four-step-process comprising material collection, descriptive analysis, category selection and material evaluation. The pattern of analytical categories is developed in a combined deductive-inductive way comprehending categories classifying the research approach (e.g., aim of research, epistemological stance, research design, method of data collection and analysis, quality measures, theoretical angle) and categories characterizing tensions in corporate transition towards sustainability (e.g., type of tension, related management strategies, level of tension, context of tension, driver for change). The structured literature review maps the current state-of-research at the intersection between corporate sustainability transition and corporate sustainability tensions, and allows for a comprehensive multi-faceted conceptualisation of tensions companies face when transiting towards (more) sustainable business. Thus, the paper adds further differentiation and conceptual depth to the emerging research stream on sustainability tensions, highlighting in particular inter-temporal (i.e. “transitional”) aspects. Moreover, it guides managers and policy-makers by depicting more realistically the challenges ahead and therefore also demonstrating room for manoeuvre. The paper prepares the ground for follow-up empirical investigations, for example into the mechanisms and challenges of sustainability transition within specific industries.
Keywords
Sustainability transition, sustainability tension, systematic literature review, content analysis.
Disclaimer: Publications about the content of this work require the written consent of Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft. The results, opinions and conclusions expressed in this thesis are not necessarily those of Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft.
5a. Corporate sustainability and CSR
