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describe this approach as a green marketing in a very conservative guise, of which the firm seeks to travel the path of least change and will only go beyond compliance
when there is a very real expectation of imminent legislation. Moreover, there are a number of firms adopting two-handed approach in
which they simultaneously respond proactively to the pressures for change, and also reactively shore up their barricades against any further legislation Peattie and Crane,
2005: 364. For example, apparel makers in one hand keep producing benign products, which in turn they lobbying legislators to enact laws that enforce other firms
in the industry to fit their operational standard into a new legislation. “Whichever approach the compliance marketers have taken though, they have
never had much hope of appealing to the environmental concerns of increasingly savvy customers, or of making any significant advances towards sustainability”
Peattie and Crane, 2005: 364. Thus, firms should carefully formulate appropriate strategy that segregates greenwashing and actual green marketing practices.
5. Sustainability
Sustainability has been buzzword in the growing globalization era to date. Some companies even solely claim that they have achieved sustainability, while their
operations adversely show unsubstantiated evidence. To be sustainable, a firm cannot merely set its own standards to measure sustainability performance. They should align
its corporate performance with some sort of commonly accepted measurements. To date, sustainability has been major concern and ongoing agenda in local and
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international forum. Thus, the trend now enforces every business entity to behave socially responsible and environmentally friendly.
a. Definition of Sustainability
As opposed to green marketing, scholars reached consensus to define sustainability. Sustainable development -as initially formalized at the Earth Summit in
1992 Earthwatch, 2000 – “is development that meets the need of the present without compromising the ability of the future generations to meet their own needs.” This
definition implies that companies should focus on limiting the consumption of present generation and leverage the ability to meet present and future needs Garimella and
Bhaskar. As a consequence, companies should put all attention to turn the operation in more efficient and effective ways, which reducing damaging impact both for
society and environment. Speaking of sustainability in organization-wide, Dyllick and Hockerts 2002
define corporate sustainability as achieving the needs of a firms direct and indirect stakeholders, -such as shareholders, employees, clients, pressure groups,
communities, etc- without compromising its ability to satisfy the needs of future stakeholders as well. From this definition, the scholars try to integrate interests of
various stakeholders towards policy that affect organization’s objectives in present and in the future. Unfortunately, both scholars fail to clarify the boundaries of the
stakeholders’ needs. Yilmaz and Flouris 2010 also justify that the vision of corporate sustainability is not well-defined, which leaves a wide approach with
various characteristics. On the other hand, Charter et al. 2002 hold that sustainability means to
maintain or prolong both environmental and human health and is simply good
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management. It simply implies the paradigm shift from utilization of hazardous materials to renewable ones, minimization of pollution effects, improvement of
working condition, and socially responsible program that touches people who do not have access to clean water, good sanitation, and other environmental-based issues.
This notion further criticizes capitalism believers to not only attain economic objective, but also pay attention in environmental and social issues. The traditional
paradigm should also turn thought from maximizing shareholders’ wealth into satisfying individuals who own stake on a firm.
In addition, Yilmaz and Flouris 2010 thoroughly discuss corporate sustainability in many perspectives. They argue that it can be viewed as a new and
evolving corporate management paradigm, of which paradigm itself implies an alternative to the traditional growth and profit maximization model. The shift should
count “future imperatives”, namely social and ecological concerns. This proposition further strengthens previous approaches that emphasize the importance of preparing
the future generation with sustainable living. Yilmaz and Flouris 2010 further enrich their study in corporate sustainability
with examining proposed definition of various scholars. Salzmann et al. 2005 define corporate sustainability as profit-driven corporate response to environmental and
social issues that are caused through the organization’s primary and secondary activities. From in-depth business core perspective, it can be defined as a business
approach that creates long-term shareholder value by embracing opportunities and managing risks derived from economic, environmental and social developments”
Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes, 2009.
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In another point of view, Yilmaz and Flouris 2010 assert that corporate sustainability management can be described in both functional and institutional
justifications. The first model is designed to guide ecological, social, and economic impacts of business activities with the direction of sustainability are developed by a
firm. Meanwhile, the latter concept argues corporate sustainability management describes the group of actors and organizational structure within the business
enterprise that are concerned with social and ecological aspects and their integration in the conventional process of operational management of business activities”.
Nonetheless, Visser 2007 employs different terms to define corporate sustainability, where it is the way in which the interface between business, society, and the
environment is managed. All the definitions point out to emphasis on social, environmental, and economic aspects, which are much popular with triple bottom line
concept.
b. Triple Bottom Line Concept
The terms sustainability is often interchangeably linked with triple bottom line TBL concept coined by Elkington 1997. To strengthen, Beilin et al. 2007 assert
“the work of Elkington 1997 and others suggests that the TBL is useful in defining the concept of sustainability, seeing the two as inextricably linked”. The concept is
growing as a widely popular conceptualization and reporting tools for justifying social, environmental, and economic performance, simply known as people, planet,
and profit. Triple bottom line gains popularity to date. Major companies argue to measure
a sustainability of a corporation cannot be seen from one perspective, economic matters solely. The integration of three-dimensional framework will assist the next
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successors and policy makers in a firm to face more complex challenges in the future. The scarcity of resources, in terms of raw materials, shortage of energy and land, and
well-educated human capital that fully concerns in social and environmental justice become prominent and all stakeholders of a firm by then to seek out the multi-faceted
solution that satisfy them and non-economic factors. Panapanaan 2002 indicates triple bottom line pertains to economic,
environmental, and social sustainability. Economic sustainability comprises of economic profitability, competitiveness, and job or market creation. By ensuring this
first bottom line fulfilled, a company can survive in highly competitive business, as well as improve employee’s welfare. In addition, environmental sustainability
constitutes the way a company uses natural resources, environmental management and protection efficiently. It implies that company should run the business in ethical,
safe, and benign ways. Meanwhile, social sustainability deals with social well being of everyone, both inside and outside the corporation. It denotes that a company should
satisfy economic well being of its employees so that they can perform more productive and it should give feedback to the society through program like corporate
social responsibility. This idea implies economic sustainability can only be achieved if business
matters, such as profit, revenues, return on investment, return on assets, competitive advantage, and employment are well-managed without hurting major stakeholders’
interests. Meanwhile, environmental sustainability should be strategized differently from economic ones because it involves participation of non-fiduciary or secondary
stakeholders in conserving nature with constraints of natural resources are upheld. To date, social sustainability is also difficult to achieve because it is somewhat changing
