This chapter offers three main historical perspectives on corporate sustainability. First, it addresses the ‘what’, ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions of corporate sustainability. It investigates the ‘what’ question through the issues to which corporate sustainability has been addressed; the ‘how’ question through the modes which have been deployed to deliver corporate sustainability; and the ‘why’ question through the rationales that have been offered for corporate sustainability. Second, it investigates the ‘who’ question by unpacking the historical roles and relationships of society, business, government and the natural environment actors. Third, it examines the ‘when’ question through three key phases of corporate sustainability. It presents corporate sustainability in the contexts of: industrialisation in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; the rise of the modern corporation and ‘managerial capitalism’ in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; and rapid internationalisation in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries bringing wider impacts of corporate power and the greater awareness of the Anthropocene and human interdependency. This analysis of three historical phases is illustrated through the experiences of two long-standing companies: Boots, the UK pharmacist, and Tata, the Indian conglomerate.

The relationship and place of firms within their natural environment is a central element of corporate sustainability. In this chapter, we provide a brief history of corporate sustainability from an ecological perspective, examine major related trends and challenges, and explore the core principles that such a perspective on corporate sustainability adopts. Several lenses to understand firms within their natural environment have been proposed; we selectively present and contrast twelve key ones relevant to business and management. We conclude by not only advocating for systems thinking as one core principle of corporate sustainability, but also calling for systems action.

Corporations can come to possess significant political capital. Consequently, they can come to exert influence not just on their own sustainability and responsible business policies and practices, but on those of society in general. To begin making sense of such influence, and of the fact that such influence is complex, multi-faceted and sometimes profound, this chapter focuses on four considerations. First, corporate involvement in multi-stakeholder initiatives is discussed. Second, the corporate capacity to influence (inter)national political processes is noted. Third, the current trend towards (potential) CEO activism, and the ways in which such activism appears shaped by ongoing transformations in social media, is outlined. Fourth, and most controversially, it is noted that, given the technologies they control, big tech corporations can play an increasingly directive role in how people comprehend, understand and decide upon decisions relating to (personal) responsibility and sustainability matters. In short, and as is re-emphasised in the chapter’s concluding remarks, the overall purpose of the chapter is to show that corporations can have a profound impact on matters relating to politics, sustainability and responsibility.

This chapter discusses the nature, legitimacy, impact and critique of voluntary standards for sustainability. We first develop a definition of sustainability standards and distinguish three different types of standards. This discussion shows that, while standardisation in the field of sustainability has grown in recent years, existing initiatives differ in several important ways. Next, we discuss how the legitimacy of sustainability standards can be assessed. We differentiate between standards’ input and output legitimacy. We then focus on the impact that sustainability standards can potentially have on adopting firms, end consumers and the regulated issue area. The final section takes a detailed look at the critique that has been raised against selected standards (e.g., the coexistence of multiple standards with a similar purpose).

This chapter is devoted to the understanding of the emerging sustainability professional. We will discuss the development of the profession, detailing what it means to be a sustainability professional, the characteristics of this work, the required specific skill sets and competencies, motivations and values driving sustainability work, and tasks and practices that it involves. You will realise that implementing sustainability is an important but tricky job because sustainability is a complex phenomenon requiring sustainability professionals to address conflicting commercial goals and sustainability goals. Therefore, it is hard to implement and measure its success. Also, due to the emergent nature of the profession, sustainability professionals need to put extra effort into building their power within an organisation to acquire much-needed managerial support and often scarcely available resources to succeed in their sustainability work. At the end of the chapter, we discuss strategies that sustainability professionals can undertake to succeed in their tough job. In particular, we discuss how sustainability professionals can promote sustainability within an organisation while safeguarding their personal motivations and values, as well as how to execute their tasks and practices in a way that does justice to all the different stakeholders, organisational needs and job demands.

This chapter introduces business model innovation for sustainability as a new way of achieving corporate sustainability. Why is thinking about business models and business model innovation useful in this regard? Because business models are essentially about how companies create value for themselves and for their stakeholders, such as customers, employees or business partners. And value creation, in turn, relates in various ways to the natural environment and society. Hence, the business model perspective is very helpful in dealing with corporate sustainability challenges. In this chapter, we explain how business models support proactive approaches to corporate sustainability; how business model innovation can help integrate sustainability principles (such as efficiency, consistency or sufficiency) into companies’ activities; and how it can help companies extend their value creation potential to be more inclusive towards non-financial stakeholders. Finally, some patterns and tools to develop business models for sustainability are introduced.

This chapter aims to advance understanding of the relationship between sustainability and development, and, in particular, the role of business in development work. First, it outlines what the concept of development encompasses, providing insights on the different forms of development work. In examining the concept of development, the chapter also provides a brief history of its emergence as an academic discipline and the four distinctive features of development studies. Second, to help students comprehend the role and contribution of business in development outcomes, the chapter discusses the different ways in which firms have supported or undermined development goals through their corporate sustainability agendas. We provide explicit key case studies on Mexico, Vietnam, South Africa and Ghana, illuminating how the presence, decisions and activities of businesses can have a long-term influence on gender (in)equality, poverty reduction, democracy promotion and climate change adaptation. Overall, the discussions in this chapter are key reflections on the private sector for development agenda, and are aimed at triggering a discussion on how core business can be best aligned with societal interests to achieve development objectives.

In the concluding chapter of the book, we reflect on the future of corporate sustainability. We summarise the key topics covered in each of the four sections – approaches, actors, processes and issues. We present past and future developments for each of these sections. We also reflect on how some of the tensions as presented in the introduction remain and become core to corporate sustainability debates. Finally, we end on a reflection of our personal roles in advancing sustainability.