Regeneration

Citation

Dillard, J. and Pullman, M.E. (2010), "Regeneration", Sustainability Accounting, Management and Policy Journal, Vol. 1 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/sampj.2010.46801baa.001

Regeneration

Article Type: Guest editorial From: Sustainability Accounting, Management and Policy Journal, Volume 1, Issue 2

We are delighted with the opportunity to participate in the first volume, second issue, of Sustainability, Accounting, Management and Policy Journal (SAMPJ). One of the reasons for our participation is a commitment to explore the possibilities for, and provide the context wherein, interdisciplinary research becomes a meaningfully operationalized activity. However, undertaking this project has illustrated to us once again the difficulties surrounding such utopian dreams. We are confronted with the incremental and instrumental nature of moving beyond the status quo. Regardless of the interdisciplinary difficulties encountered, one thing becomes clear and that is the necessity of the non-traditional, interdisciplinary thinking required in addressing the issues that have come to be associated with sustainability.

The call for papers identified the following as possible topics: employees and organizations, operations and supply chain, social entrepreneurship and inclusive business, the value proposition and consumers, and accounting and measurement. Various components were listed under these such as building creativity into sustainability initiatives, designing and implementing sustainability procurement policies, delivering on community investment initiatives, contextual influence on sustainability-based purchasing decisions, and sustainability reporting and rethinking the assurance function.

As we began to evaluate these topic listings and the papers submitted from the conference for this special issue in light of the editorial philosophy of SAMPJ, we realized that these topic listings were indicative of the type of unidimensional perspective that the journal is designed to supersede. What such topic statements do is to infuse sustainability rhetoric into the standard business consultancy catch phrases. They add a sustainability dimension but do very little in moving us toward more inclusive, interdisciplinary perspectives. They do not acknowledge the level of interdisciplinary thought required for meaningful regeneration.

And, there is some question as to the concept of re-generation being the best way to frame the new and significant demands associated with attaining a generative state with regards to the social and ecological systems. Re-generation seems to be a meaningful perspective when considering ecosystems. The earth has such capacities for overcoming the ravages of global market capitalism. Is this a valid analogy when we move into the social sphere? There seems to be a certain arrogance on our part as we seek to exploit the social system. For example, “building creativity in” infuses an element of determinism, and then there are some dominant, at least implicit, constraints such as the necessity of focusing these “creative” activities toward enhancing the “business case” for sustainability. What if this pursuit of built in creativity regenerates the currently degenerative mechanisms leading to a more unsustainable “sustainably inspired” organization? Recognizing these limitations has made us more aware of the incremental nature of our perspective and the necessity for broadening our horizons. With this in mind, we move on to the work included in this special issue of SAMPJ.

Consistent with the editorial objective of SAMPJ, our purpose for the conference as well as the special issue is to facilitate a more inclusive perspective by moving toward integration and interdisciplinary perspectives on sustainability particularly as they relate to accounting, business, related policy issues, and ultimately, practice. We envision research projects and collaborations that encourage us to see the bigger picture and to work together to solve real and significant problems. While we are a long way away from achieving this objective, this special issue initiates a forum for such research especially as it relates to the interactions between social and environmental sustainability, accounting, management, and policy. At this initial phase, the contributions are disparate and are situated at various distant locations within the intellectual terrain. The seven studies presented herein draw from varied theoretical and methodological perspectives situated within differing socio-economic and political environments with an international, national and organizational context taking a single, inter- or multi- disciplinary perspective. They employ both qualitative and quantitative methodologies as well as literature review and conceptualization.

Diversity we have, but, as noted above, we found interdisciplinarity to be a bit more challenging being constrained both by our initial conceptualization, restricting the submissions to the conference, underdeveloped evaluation criteria, and, thus, lack of consensus within the editorial process. We were able to attract several papers with interdisciplinary author teams. We were also able to include a wide range of diversity in the levels of academic experience of the authors, something for which we also made a conscious effort to do through encouraging broad participation in the conference. This eclectic group of articles and group of authors provide context or frames useful in conceptualizing and undertaking interdisciplinary research of accounting, management and policy wherein new ideas can be developed and empirical research designed and carried out. The work provides a beginning for more extensive interdisciplinary and methodological contexts.

Dale S. Rogers, Zachary S. Rogers, and Ronald Lembke study an often-neglected economy, secondary markets, using financial reports, news articles, and interviews with experts in order to estimate the scope and size of secondary markets. The results indicate that these secondary markets are significant in that they divert a significant amount of potential waste from landfills as well as creating jobs in this sector. The authors estimate that these secondary markets represented approximately 2.28 percent of the US GDP in 2008. These markets represent an important component in considering product stewardship and life cycle management.

Alan Murray, Kathryn Haynes, and Lucian J. Hudson undertake an ambitious task that directly addresses our intended purpose of the special edition as well as the conference. The work investigates the problems and possibilities of corporate social responsibility and sustainability found in the gap between the genres of academic literature and practitioner perspectives and explicitly considers the possibilities of collaboration. The complexities of collaborative relationships among business, government, and NGOs are outlined and located within the academic literature. The authors consider the role of civil society, explore the linkages between theory and practice as they relate to notions of sustainability and contemplate the policy implications of business, government, and NGO collaboration.

Elizabeth Stubblefield Loucks, Martin L. Martens and Charles H. Cho represent an interdisciplinary team within the business academy and call for expanding the traditional scope of inquiry to include small- and medium-size businesses in sustainability research, policy, and practice. They propose and develop a business case focus as a means for engaging small- and medium-size entities (SME) in the sustainability project and provide an extensive literature review of the related SME literature.

Marc J. Epstein and Kristi Yuthas are two seasoned accounting researchers who have broadened their intellectual scope well beyond the context of traditional accounting research. Here, they report on their ongoing work related to the micro-finance industry. These two academic experts in the field present an excellent discussion of the micro-finance industry, and the problems faced thereby. Not only do they provide an in-depth understanding of the literature, Marc J. Epstein and Kristi Yuthas also speak from extensive field experience related to their work with micro-finance organizations worldwide. They note the importance of value chain knowledge and management as a key success factor for microfinance-enterprises and discuss in detail one of the major obstacles to successfully achieving the social objectives – loss of clarity in mission.

Erica Mina Okada and Eric L. Mais undertake behavioral experiments that demonstrate that size of the “green premium” customers are willing to pay can be influenced by how green products’ characteristics are framed. Positive framing is shown to be more effective with environmentally conscious consumers. Negative framing is shown to be more effective with less environmentally conscious consumers. By negative framing, these authors mean providing information showing how the consumers might avoid the disadvantages of non-green products. Specifically, the authors show that subtractive price framing where the focus is on the discount paid for non-green items yields a higher green premium for more environmentally conscious consumers and that additive price framing which focuses on the additional price paid for green products for the less environmentally conscious consumers.

Randolph E. Schwering provides a conceptual model identifying some traditional sources of judgment error in individual environmental sense making. In light of the literature and model, recommendations are presented that could possibly mitigate some of the biases. The author argues that by responding in an informed manner to these dysfunctions will lead to improved effectiveness of business policies as they relate to environmental risks and opportunities.

Hank C. Alewine presents a model for conducting experimental, environmental accounting research. The work presents an extensive literature review of the methods used in the extant social and environmental accounting research and identifies a paucity of experimental research in the area. The author makes a case for experimental/behavioral research in the sustainability field and develops guidelines as to how this might be successfully undertaken. Important social and environmental issues are identified that might be meaningfully addressed using experimental research methods. A framework is constructed providing guidance in applying experimental methodology to social and environmental issues.

We have organized the papers in terms of their primary focus on policy, management, and then accounting. The first three papers provide insights useful in more general policy implications. Dale S. Rogers, Zachary S. Rogers, and Ronald Lembke suggest a need to recognize, facilitate, and expand the secondary market sector. Alan Murray, Kathryn Haynes, and Lucian J. Hudson explore the issues associated with and what is needed to encourage collaboration among business, government, and civil society. Elizabeth Stubblefield Loucks, Martin L. Martens and Charles H. Cho advocate more explicitly recognizing the importance of small- and medium-size enterprises and consider incentives associated with motivating more environmentally sensitive behavior. The next set of articles is concerned primarily with organizational management and strategy. Marc J. Epstein and Kristi Yuthas address strategic issues associated with both social enterprise and for-profit organizations operating in the micro-finance industry. The next three papers take a more micro perspective, looking at specific issues and decision-making processes. Erica Mina Okada and Eric L. Mais report on an empirical study comparing alternative price-framing strategies for “green” products. Both Randolph E. Schwering and Hank C. Alewine consider the context for individual decision making concerning environmentally related management decisions and provide suggestions for overcoming them both in practice and in research.

Jesse Dillard, Madeleine E. PullmanGuest Editors