Australian Financial Review Rationalism fails the ethics test Kashona Carnegie 01/08/2001 We are walking on a knife edge between the possibility of an ethically sustainable society and our current unethical world where big business devours people, nature and other businesses in the name of bigger and bigger profits. Despite their protestations to the contrary, the actions of these organisations demonstrate that they have no idea of what it means to be ethical. Merely complying, usually begrudgingly, with environmental laws and sponsoring an art exhibition are empty token gestures. But isn't capitalism all about big profits? Not exactly. The Western world does not operate under a true capitalist system at all. In essence, capitalism is about creating and spending your income while preserving the resources or capital you use to make that income. Those resources consist of more than just money. For most organisations, natural and social resources are needed to make money. Yet the current form of economic rationalism focuses on preserving money to make more money, no matter the cost to natural and social resources. As we are witnessing with the growing number of corporate collapses, these practices are unsustainable and, as such, unethical. We might be living in an economic capitalist society, but until we factor in the social and the ecological capital that go to produce unethical profits, we do not have a holistic form of ethically sustainable capitalism. It is true that in order for a business to remain viable it must make a profit. However, there is a big difference between the original notion of business and what is happening today. Originally, business was about working to support the good of society. You do what you do well and sell that commodity to me at a small profit and each of us does the same. That is the heart of an ethical society. Ethics is all about following guiding principles that ensure that society and the environment are treated fairly and justly. Contrast that form of business with our current economic capitalism, based on greed, egocentric power structures and the delusion that this is ethically acceptable. Broadly speaking, ethical sustainability can be demonstrated through forms of the triple bottom line, often depicted as an equilateral triangle, with the apex boldly labelled economics. At either end of the base line are the labels social and environment. I suggest that the environment label should be at the apex and economics on the base line. Then invert the triangle as a reminder that our focus of concern should be on the environment, precariously balancing on the inverted apex, not on the economics, because if the environmental resources collapse, there is no economic or social bottom line. If you need proof of the state of the environment, next time you are overseas have a look at the 24-hour-a-day pall of pollution over most European and American cities. The notion of ethical sustainability is quite supportive of big profits, as long as those profits are in proportion to social and ecological profits. The greater the social and ecological bottom lines, the greater the economic bottom line can be. All it takes is a new mindset born of creative thought and innovative ideas. Whether we like it or not, a major social revolution is nigh, as demonstrated by the growth of community banks, community petrol outlets and continuing global protests, such as those at Seattle and Genoa. Despite the questionable methods of some, at the heart of all of these protests is the call for ethical sustainability. Meanwhile, more and more shareholders are looking for ethical investments, as evidenced by the recent listing of the FTSE 4 Good. Surely the time has come to re-examine corporate and personal values and summon the courage to make the move to ethical sustainability. Dr Kashonia Carnegie is a sustainability ethicist with the School of Management, University of Queensland Business School. This material is subject to copyright and any unauthorised use, copying or mirroring is prohibited. This story was found at: http://afr.com/specialreports/report2/2001/08/01/FFXNQ0IPPPC.html ************************************************************************* This posting is provided to the individual members of this group without permission from the copyright owner for purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship and research under the "fair use" provisions of the Federal copyright laws and it may not be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner, except for "fair use." -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archived at http://www.cat.org.au/lists/leftlink/ Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
