In view of the increasing public awareness for sustainability issues,
insufficient or failed corporate sustainability-measures bear a serious
risk of backfiring on the corporations, for example in form of increased
Greenwashing accusations, social costs or environmental risks. This book
aims to discuss the potential of a systems perspective (systems
thinking, systems science) to improve the success of corporate
sustainability measures. The book argues that measures of corporate
sustainability often fall short, not primarily through individual
failures of corporations, but rather due to unsustainable systemic
structures arising from the interaction between a corporation and its
shareholders and driven by dynamics unfolding in the process. The
pitfall of these structures is that they remain undetected due to a lack
of a systems perspective and run the risk of backfiring on the
corporation itself. These structures constitute Sustainability Traps:
Reoccurring dynamic patterns of failed sustainability measures that
backfire on corporations. The book aims to discuss why and how a systems
perspective (systems thinking) as an organizational learning discipline,
can be used to address Sustainability Traps and thus to improve success
of corporate sustainability measures.
