Image: Brian Barnett (http://www.flickr.com/photos/isdky/3460713256/)

In researching the practice of corporate sustainability, many of the people I interview highlight the problem of trying to promote and live in a more sustainable way. Here, they stress how trying to take public transport, reduce your carbon footprint, choose renewable power, or build a sustainable home, seem to be increasingly difficult and costly, as if our entire economic system is biased against sustainable options. As one manager put it ‘I feel like I’m working upstream all the time.’

Given I teach organisational sustainability, I was pondering this idea when I came across a revealing insight in a sustainability textbook chapter by Gillen Wood entitled ‘It’s Not Easy Being Green: Anti-Environmental Discourse, Behavior, and Ideology’. In this chapter, Gillen makes the point that our current economic system focuses solely on the immediate satisfaction of consumer desires and blinds us to the broader connectivity of our actions. Moreover, he notes this narrow, short-term perspective has been normalised. We are conditioned through advertising and popular culture to constantly demand more and newer stuff, blind to the broader impacts of our hyper-consumption. As this video titled ‘The Story of Stuff’ highlights, our economic system is based inherently upon ‘unsustainability’:

So is ‘sustainability’ in fact possible in an economic system reliant upon ‘unending’ material economic growth in a finite world? The Brundtland report in 1987 set down the now widely acknowledged definition of sustainable development as ‘…development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’. This is fine as an aspirational goal, but is it realistic given the nature of a capitalist economy? As the recent work on ‘planetary boundaries‘ highlights, we are as a species now crossing fundamental ecological limits. Things like climate change, loss of biodiversity, stratospheric ozone depletion, ocean acidification, chemical pollution, the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles, freshwater depletion, and atmospheric aerosol loading. In this context, ‘sustainability’ appears more a form of obfuscation. For example, witness the recent debate surrounding ’sustainable palm oil‘. Here, the industry body has ratified the concept despite the clear environmental evidence that clearing rainforests and draining peat marshes to make way for palm oil plantations is anything but environmentally sustainable!

One of my favourite reality checks on ‘sustainability’ as a concept is from a soon to be released book Flourishing by John Ehrenfeld and Andy Hoffman (2013), where they make the point that:

At this moment in time, almost everything being done in the name of sustainability entails attempts to reduce unsustainability. But reducing unsustainability, although critical, does not and will not create sustainability.

Says it all really! Being less unsustainable is a good start but it isn’t the same as sustainability. So what would real sustainability look like in our modern, globalised, hyper-consumptive economy – and is such a concept even possible given the powerful economic forces driving in the opposite direction?

Bill Healy, Chief Executive of CIRIA, welcomed attendees and provided an overview of the changes that the industry has seen in the short time since Peter Hansford’s tenure as Chief Construction Advisor began in November 2012. Bill highlighted the continuing economic challenges, as well as changes to procurement models and the growth of new technologies such as BIM and off-site construction, as enablers for change in the industry.

Prof John Connaughton provided his own personal opinion on today’s construction industry, highlighting the need to build capacity and sounding a warning of the need to look at the corporatisation of professional services in the UK and internationally. John posed the question of whether market pressures and the trend of consolidation through mergers and acquisitions by the major international engineering consultancies and contractors, is leading to a more business-led approach to the construction profession. John questioned what the implications could be for knowledge transfer if knowledge begins to become more commoditised and noted that CIRIA is one of the few industry bodies devoted to dissemination of knowledge. In summing up, John questioned whether sustainability should be seen as an aspiration rather than an obligation and quoted the Danish architect Bjarke Ingels who calls for a “move from unsustainable hedonism to hedonistic sustainability.”

Peter Hansford then presented an overview of the forthcoming Industrial Strategy for Construction, describing it as a shared long-term vision for the industry, created with and developed for business, and with the full support from across Government. Peter noted that, when published, the Strategy should be seen as more than just a report, and will be an ‘agenda’ to enable the construction sector to grow and ultimately be an enabling sector for growth in the UK economy. Peter highlighted the benefits that the pipeline of major projects has brought, and is bringing, in helping the industry to plan ahead. The vision that Peter hopes the Strategy will set out is of an industry that operates in a safe and healthy manner, attracts the best talent who are equipped with the right skills, and one in which innovation is encouraged so that the UK construction industry is ready to capitalise on the vast opportunities for global trade.

The speakers’ presentations are available via the post-event information CIRIA webpage at www.ciria.org/events

Locally grown produce is a common push/pull factor for the ecologically conscious of us when food shopping. Strawberries from Kent obviously have a smaller carbon footprint than strawberries from the States, and eggs from England have greener credentials than eggs from Egypt. And this is great; it is a step in the right direction if UK, as a nation, wants to reduce their impact upon this world. The supermarkets are slowly cottoning on too.

However, in the grand scale of things, this change, I think, is pretty small, and I propose that where possible, local communities, such as small towns and villages, should sell their excess produce (arable and livestock) locally. There are numerous benefits of this, which I will outline below:

1)      Carbon footprints – locally sourced produce comes with a much less significant carbon footprint. The distance food has travelled could be measured in meters rather than miles. The waste from this food would be pooled either in a green/garden waste collection scheme, or in personal composters. This keeps the nutrients gained and lost from these plants in the local area, with the compost being available to gardeners to re-stock the mineral and nutrient levels in their soils.

2)      Community – The local community getting together and growing and trading produce is a great way to get to know your neighbours and to learn about services that they can do that benefit you. For example, you may travel to a large city once a week to visit your therapist, racking up miles of carbon emissions in your car. However, there could quite possibly be a local therapist that you aren’t aware of. Also, a daily/bi weekly food market in the town keeps money local, allowing the residents to see more benefits of their local spending.

3)      The food will be honest with few hidden dangers. Small scale agriculture rarely uses harmful pesticides/insecticides. There will likely be no genetic modification (which is often frowned upon), and best of all, it won’t be packaged in several meters of plastic packaging. Transportation from plot to market will obviously need the use of plastic/wooden crates, but the produce will be sold loose, with no plastic wrap around each item. This also gives the buyer much better control over which products they buy, e.g. large tomatoes or smaller tomatoes.

4)       Major supermarkets have size regulations on each produce item to make sure they are ‘aesthetically pleasing’. So if a carrot had a diameter outside its 35-65mm range, for example, it would be discarded or rejected. Local market shops are much less likely to discard unusually shaped produce. An example of this is locally grown lemons, like in the picture below, which would not be sold by supermarkets but are for sale at local Italian markets.

5)      In the case of a national/global disaster, countries relying on imported/exported food can be caught short when supplies dry up. Having locally grown food means that invariably you will have a good annual supply of food, but if a disaster strikes your area, you can still rely on imported food if needed. However, if you originally rely on imported food and disaster strikes, there will not be enough locally produced food to keep everyone fed.

6)      The reduced time between picking/killing and consuming the produce means that fewer nutrients will be lost from the food, making the food better for you/more nutritious.

7)      Local food also preserves genetic diversity – widely grown produce varieties are selected for their quick ripening, large fruit bearing or visually pleasing etc. properties, slowly pushing out the less ‘favourable’ varieties that could be lost over time.

The re-growth of local butchers, bakers, dairymen, fish mongers, greengrocers and the like will keep the focus local and prices will be lower due to lower transport costs. The main appeal of a supermarket is that every item you could need would be under one roof, but if a large barn or empty warehouse was converted into a market-hall, every item would be available in the same building, requiring only one trip a week to get all groceries.

Further green ideas can then be implemented, such as responsibly sourced local paper bags, lift sharing to the markets or a market shuttle bus to maintain the respobsibility and sustainability of this idea.

Obviously, there are many more factors affecting the decision of a town/city/country to change to this way of life, and with the majority of people living in urban areas, supermarkets seem to be the only place to buy produce, but spare/waste land, excess garden space could be used to help grow locally available food, which can then be sold at smaller markets or high street shops, or in a supermarket type market building like suggested above.

It is becoming increasingly important that we as humans are becoming more responsible in many aspects of our life, and by simply reverting to a tried and tested method of feeding the nation that has been phased out by supermarkets and recent shopping trends, we can greatly improve our green credentials as a village, town, country or continet.

Further Reading

http://www.uvm.edu/vtvegandberry/factsheets/buylocal.html

http://turningearthllc.com/the-importance-of-local-food-production/

See? I’ve framed the lovely view from my apartment overlooking the brown and grey silo which has been the backdrop of my dystopian fantasies since 2009. In less than two weeks I will exhibit there together with twelve other artists, architects and designers. See pamphlet and The Bas Silo-blog.

Oh and Ahh…here’s a piece of scratched plexiglass for my installation catching a glimpse of sunlight prior to deportation into the darkness of the silo.

FUTURE RUINS is an  exhibition on the theme of Obsolescence and Inoperativity.

The event will take place in the silo space at Bergen Arkitekthøgskole  (BAS) from May 27th-31st, 2013, during Bergen Kommune’s Klimauke (Bergen Municipality Climate Week).

The exhibition will be open to the public daily from 16:00 – 20:00.

GRAND OPENING Monday May 27th starting at 18:00

Participants:

*Anna Andrea Vik Aniksdal (Bergen/BAS)* *Nicolas Barrette (Toronto/U of T)* *Andrew Bateman/Veronica Simmonds/Phanuel Antwi (Halifax)*
*Samuel Carvalho (Berlin/raumlabor)* *Florian Goldmann (Berlin/UdK)* *Tarik Hindic (Bergen)* *Cressida Kocienski (London)* *Lasse Kilvaer (Oslo/Melbourne)* *Sybille Neumeyer (Stuttgart)* *Hidemi Nishida (Japan/Bergen)* *Ellen Ringstad (Bergen/KHIB)* *Dagmar Schurrer (Berlin)* *Håvard Tveito (Bergen/BAS)*

What is permaculture?

Permaculture can be described as humans dance with nature where nature takes the lead. The word comes from ‘permanent agriculture’ and was later broadened to include ‘permanent culture’ – it is about living lightly on the planet and making sure that we can sustain human activities for many generations to come, in harmony with nature.

This combines three key aspects:

1. an ethical framework

2. understandings of how nature works, and

3. a design approach.

Permaculture diagram

This unique combination can be applied to anything from a market garden design to a large farm or even a building. Its purpose is to support the creation of sustainable, agriculturally productive, non-polluting and healthy settlements and systems. In many places this means adapting our existing settlements; in other cases it can mean starting from scratch. Both offer interesting challenges and opportunities but some may look at permaculture and ask ‘have we not been doing this already for thousands of years?’

The history of permaculture

Given the mirror-like relationship between indigenous peoples and the natural world, it would appear so. We can see permaculture principles at play when we observe the innovative ways the Amazonians have created top soils despite the rapid ruin of rainforests or, the Aboriginal’s use of control burning techniques to germinate seeds and shape the landscape.

Amazonian top-soil [via purefixion.com]

How can it help you?

Permaculture is there to address our needs without producing a huge carbon footprint, mimicking the natural laws of nature and catching energy in multiple ways before it is dissipated. It can also be a way of observing the relationships between plants, which has in the past led us to further understanding how companion crops and undersowing in your garden can produce maximum yield, minimal waste. For example, the ‘three sisters’ are a good crop companion to try at home; a pea plant, squash and maize plant all work well to support each other as the maize offers the pea support to climb up, the pea fixes nitrogen in the soil for the maize and when the maize dies and decomposes it feeds the undersown squash.

‘Three sisters’ crop companions

Humans need to learn to live more reciprocally and reverse the alienation that mechanisation and industrial society has brought. Permaculture is a reaction to this alienation: a choice to restore and maintain the balance which keeps so many natural systems in delicate relatedness. A true working natural system produces no waste; everything gets broken down and used again. Why should it be any different in human settlements? The excess use of both fertilisers and pesticides in large scale farms has killed much of the microbial soil life and it also has a direct relationship with the existence of cancer in humans.

What can you do?

1- Think about where your food comes from. You can convert lawns to grow your own food, especially vegetables. Alternatively, you can try to source as much of your food from local and organic sources, or find out about local veg-box schemes.

2- Conduct a simple home energy audit. Permaculture is not just for the green-fingered among us; it can simply mean reducing waste energy and water use and instead harnessing natural resources. This isn’t as stressful as it sounds! It’s as simple as turning off lights when they aren’t needed, keeping the thermostat at a lower temperature and putting on a sweater, or choosing not to use machines like dishwashers or tumble dryers when air drying could be just as effective.

3- Watch A Farm for the Future to find out how else you can help. It’s an interesting documentary that looks at the problems with large-scale farming practices and addresses how permaculture can offer a real solution.

Permanence is not about everything staying the same. It’s about stability, about deepening soils and cleaner water, thriving communities in self-reliant regions, biodiverse agriculture and social justice, peace and abundance for all.

4-Free online permaculture course by Regenerative Leadership Institute -  72+hour course lectures free (mostly videos) at http://www.permaculturedesigntraining.com.

This post was written by Jennifer Condell who is the newest member of the Healthy Planet team and has studied Permaculture / Practical Sustainability in West Cork Ireland. http://www.kinsalefurthered.ie/courses/fetac-level-5/permaculture-2/

All proceeds from this ballistic (minus the VAT which we have to give to the government) and song will be donated to Sea Shepherd, the global non-profit marine conservation charity.

Imagine a walk along a coastal footpath on a sunny day, with flowers blooming all around and the fresh scent of the sea on the breeze

The Mermaid ballistic (£2.50) has been specially created for this project and lovingly handmade from fresh, natural ingredients; lavender oil to relax, lemon oil to clear the mind and seaweed and sea salt to cleanse and soften the skin.

Once purchased online, you’ll receive an email containing a link to download the song for free.

Visit www.lush.co.uk to purchase the ballistic.

European investment is improving socially responsible investment practices.
Image: brightgreentalent.com

A survey released this month by the Association of the Luxembourg Fund Industry (ALFI) showed that European investment is making progress in socially responsible investing practices, but still has vast room for improvement.  European investments in sustainable segments are estimated at 129.5 billion Euros, which represent only 1.6% of total investments.  The report concluded that while socially responsible investment is increasing, it is still a niche market.

Luxembourg and France are the leading European countries managing sustainable assets, with the two countries combined accounting for about half of measured assets.  The most popular categories for responsible investing are in the environmental category: carbon emission reduction and renewable energy make up the largest subcategories listed in the survey.  Microfinance is the leading subcategory in the social investment area.  However, the majority of funds, about 70%, are represented by “cross-sectoral” funds that only measure positive results rather than focus on a particular theme, making responsible investment practices more muddled in a world calling for more clarity.

The report highlights some key findings as to how sustainable investment can be improved.  First, there is wide confusion about what sustainable terminology means as there are no standardized definitions of terms across industries.  Many companies also still struggle with clarifying and sharing data, showing a gap in completion and accuracy for potential investors reviewing information.  The report also suggested that asset managers provide more clarity on their investment strategies.  Many people in the industry are waiting on regulations from the European Union before moving responsible inventing forward due to the lack of clarity on terms.  ALFI professionals also encourage more third party verification systems to improve quality of data.

Learning Objective

AOI: Environments

Significant Concept/ Theme:

Sustainability  & Wellness (living life without harming the nature)

What you give is what you get (Dealing with nature is a reverse effect)

 “How do we compensate mother nature?” 

The following is a guest blog post by Michael Mobbs…

So it’s 2013 and my house beside Sydney’s central business district, Sydney’s Sustainable House, has been disconnected from mains water and sewer since 1996, some 16 years ago.  All the daytime energy is from the sun, and the energy company sends me cheques for my clean energy from the sun I sell them during the day.  Four people have lived here for energy and water bills of less than $300 each year.

How did I get myself out of my bills and into this lovely pickle?

Two things got me here.  The first was engineers telling me it couldn’t be done; thanks fellas.  The second was my fed-up-ness with the sound of my voice complaining about governments not doing anything about the pollution from electricity stations they owned and make money from.  So when we decided to make the kitchen and bathroom bigger in the 19^th century terrace house we decided to stop our own sewage and energy pollution during the three month renovation.

Here are five tips for making your house, office or units sustainable. The first two are emotional – sorry, this will be over quickly.

Firstly, you don’t have to be special to do this – I’m not – so don’t worry about your capacity to cut your own pollution. All the tanks, panels, systems can be bought and put into your project tomorrow by local tradespeople.

Secondly, you just have to want to do it – have the will.  You’ll find as many architects, engineers, planners, friends who’ll say you can’t do it as those who say you can.  Listen to your heart, look at government inaction and give yourself permission to act ahead of them.

The other three tips can be listed:

·      Choose simple systems, not complicated, fancy new ones, that you can see have been working well

·      Don’t fuss about the solar panels, the water and sewage systems; choose proven installers whose business has been going several years who will know how to install the systems.  And, having been in business some years, you can expect they’ll be around to back up warranties when or if the systems fail.

·      Set a budget of about $20,000 for the energy, water and recycled systems and set measurable goals that you make part of the contract with the builder, engineer and designer; eg no stormwater to leave the site, all rain water to be used for drinking, cooking, hot water.

Click on the picture below for a Sustainable House fact sheet.

For more information on Michael’s journey, the mistakes, products, design and data on the house check out his book, Sustainable House (2 Ed 2010).

You can find his website at http://sustainablehouse.com.au/

Join the movement at www.1millionwomen.com.au

The brief provides information on the latest developments of the Dinaric Arc Sustainable Hydropower Initiative (DASHI) as well as further news on freshwater and hydropower in the region. It also provides information on the latest developments of the Dinaric Arc Sustainable Hydropower Initiative (DASHI) as well as further news on freshwater and hydropower in the region. [Note: contains copyrighted material].

[PDF format, 5 pages, 341 KB].

It is an important question facing our nation.

Childhood obesity and diabetes are on the rise, yet the rates of exclusive breastfeeding at 6 months in the USA hover at only 16%. How can all mothers access the support they need and deserve?

Both the World Health Organization and  the American Academy of Pediatrics recommend All babies should be fed breastmilk, and only breast milk, for the first six months of life! Continued breastfeeding along with the introduction of whole-foods is what is best for babies after 6 months.

At Daisy C.H.A.I.N. Creating Healthy Alliances In New-Mothering we believe mothers want to provide their babies with the very best nutrition.  We acknowledge that there are significant barriers to successfully achieving personal goals and the research and evidence based goal of exclusive breastfeeding for 6 months.  These barriers are faced by new-mothers each day. Enabling All women to access care at no personal cost from qualified professionals in their own community is a solid foundation for supporting new-mothers to overcome the barriers they will encounter, thus enabling them to mother at their best.

Our organization is committed to shifting the current dialogue prevalent in our communities during the postpartum period and revolutionizing the type of care all new-mothers and their families are able to access. Please join us in supporting this important goal.

Each and every program offered by Daisy C.H.A.I.N. Creating Healthy Alliances In New-Mothering is proven through research, and is evidence-based to IMPROVE outcomes for new-mothers and their families.

So, do you believe breastfeeding support from an IBCLC and postpartum doula care from trained and experienced professionals should be free to all women?  You CAN help make it a reality!

FIRST, Imagine what that may look like in your own community…

• healthier infants, babies, toddlers, children and adults!

• a culture openly supportive of breastfeeding women.

• mothers wrapped-up in easily accessible care from qualified professionals.

• centrally located Neighborhood New-Mothering Centers.

• >75% rate of exclusive breastfeeding at 6 months!

NEXT, “Share the Love” with breastfeeding women in your family, workplace, community!  Stop in and visit the Neighborhood New-Mothering Center to see what this type of care looks like, ask our volunteer staff questions and share your feedback!

FINALLY, Donate Now to the not-for-profit, community based & all volunteer run organization Daisy C.H.A.I.N. Creating Healthy Alliances In New-Mothering!  Every dollar helps make our mission a reality.

What is our mission?

We provide the community with research and evidence-based education and support services for new-mothers and their families because All women deserve breastfeeding support from an IBCLC and postpartum doula care from qualified members of their community.  All services are free to clients.

This is our mission and now is the time to make it yours!

$250, $100, $50, $25, $10, $5, $1 can help shift current practices and offer All new-mothers support that will help improve their outcomes!  Please make a one time or recurring donation today!

Children are the future.  Lets invest in their health now by ensuring All  mothers gain access to an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant and postpartum doula care!  We are all connected within community, like the linked stems on a daisy chain.

Thank You.

resource:  http://www.cdc.gov/breastfeeding/data/reportcard2.htm

Blender

Pedal mill/thresher

What do you do with crapped out bicycles nobody wants anymore?

You turn them into pedal power.

A Guatemalan NGO in San Andrés Itzapa, called Maya Pedal, reconditions donated bicycles to make a whole raft of pedal-powered machines they call Bicimaquinas, which are designed to help local communities in all sorts of ways that would normally require electricity or hand power.

Coffee depulper

Rope pump

These Bicimaquinas range from a mobile water pump to a bicycle nut sheller, a kitchen blender (yep!) and a bicycle mill/corn thresher. They are easy to maintain, produce no pollution, free the user from rising energy costs and provide exercise.

What a great idea!

Maya Pedal relies on the help and work of a mix of locals and volunteers in their Guatemalan workshop and their goal is to be …“a center of pedal power research and development and an information resource for NGO’s promoting appropriate technology and small scale, sustainable agriculture.”

Maya Pedal Guatemalan workshop

Carlos demonstrates the machines to local farmers

It’s also got me thinking about the developed world with its rising obesity and rising costs of electricity … Can you see where I’m going here?

What if, household members shared a daily cycling routine (say, half an hour to an hour each a day) that would help power their home’s electricity (or, maybe, power the dishwasher or make a smoothie), which would, in turn, reduce their bills and improve their health and fitness …?

What do you think, too far-fetched?

You’re gonna LOVE this one if you have trouble with complexity. Tabletop greenhouse for sunflower sprouts? Don’t mind if I do!

Materials: A milk carton, empty and clean. An optional empty container from grated parmesan cheese. The crappy kind. One sharp blade.

Step one. Saw milk carton in half, top to bottom. Open up.
Step two (optional): Saw cheese bottle in half. Open up.
Step 3: Add dirt and seeds and water.
If you went without step 2, then congrats! You have an indoor raised bed for tiny crops! (read:sprouts only… Maybe moss if you just like that sort of thing?)
If you DID do step two, then there’s now a tricky bonus step… Number 4!
Step 4: Put the clear plastic… On top of… The other pieces. If you did it right, it should look kind of like mine. If it doesn’t, reread the above steps and make sure you haven’t omitted crucial, NON-optional steps like one, or, say, 3. That will hinder success.

Ta daa! Indoor (tiny) greenhouse! I recommend planting sunflower sprouting seed, removing the domes at 5-7 days in, and cutting down and reseeding at 2 weeks… If you use NO lighting.

Health starts… Well… With SPROUTS! So… Grow your own! …in a super-cool looking mini greenhouse made from FREE GARBAGE!

Recycling for the win!!!

Part II. What is Existentialism?

Like sustainable development, existentialism suffers from ontological ambiguity, as it is notoriously difficult to define. Solomon (2000) describes existentialism as a “philosophy of life, a philosophy about who we are.” This vague description reflects the diversity within existential thought. The term is broadly attributed to the ideas of philosophers Søren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Albert Camus (among others).  While each of these philosophers is unique, and most would oppose being labeled an “existentialist,” they are all identified as such due to their distinct ways of approaching issues from a focus of examining the role of existence (Crowell, 2010).

An existential issue, or the “existential position,” is often found as a crisis of existence–as a product of the consciousness of being–in which one must choose the nature of one’s existence without guidance from an external source (Agarwal & Malloy, 2000: 146). When a person has an existential crisis, foundational meaning and value in existence becomes questioned and nihilism becomes dominant. This is when the consciousness must choose without referring to any ontologically objective guidelines or values. It’s a back and forth between ‘what should I do,’ to ‘why does it matter what I choose?’

This crisis comes from the concern of Dasein; it is a critique of the present and the reflectance on how existence could, and should, be different (Critchley, 1997; Solomon, 2000). Thus, existentialism rejects Panglossian ‘best of all possible worlds’ mentality and instead demands that “things be otherwise” (Critchley, 1997). This is accompanied with a strong emphasis on the individual’s freedom to fulfill this demand.

The basic definition of sustainable development provided by Brundtland, with it’s emphasis on meeting basic inter and intra-generational needs, implies that global conditions are not at their best, and things should be different.  However, this places the individual in an existential position because, despite the concern to act in response to the crisis, sustainable development is a problem with no clear definition or objective solution (Bebbington, 2001, Crowell, 2010). It is a concept steeped with diverging values and ultimately has no ultimate meaning or foundation. This in itself has led to many environmental nihilists. Yet existentialism may help with this.

As a philosophy for the individual, existentialism is concerned with how one can most authentically make choices when faced with such a crisis; thus, it can be thought of as a “theory of choice” (Kaldermis, 2010; Agarwal & Malloy, 2000). It is in the distinct approach developed in reaction to this kind of existential position that make the above philosophers existentialists.

Existentialism approaches ‘authenticity’ by recognizing that “thinking about human existence requires new categories not found in the conceptual repertoire of ancient or modern thought” (Crowell, 2010). Instead, human problems deserve human solutions. Because human beings are complex, rational, irrational, and emotional, this philosophy can be understood as a “sensibility” of thought centered around reflecting on “who we are in a very new and bold way” in order to address the existential position (Solomon, 2000). With this approach, certain humanistic themes emerge: including issues of uncertainty, understanding the role of passion in relation to rationality, and the significance of human freedom in terms of choice and responsibility (Solomon, 2000).

Before the relationship between sustainable development and these existential themes can be further examined, it is necessary to understand the broader historical context from which these ideas are placed and the fundamentally unique ontologies from which they are grounded.

Next part: III A New Ontology

As its name suggests, Sustainability quite literally means the ability to sustain oneself – to be resilient in the face of adversity - and as the world continues to exist in a state of flux, this ability has never been more crucial. 

A trend pervading boardroom agendas industry-wide is the issue of Complexity; those ‘wicked’ problems that keep executives up at night. The multi-layered, ever-evolving type that are mostly unexpected and usually beyond direct control. 

The Global Financial Crisis was a complex issue with unprecedented impact that clearly highlighted the inter-connectedness of the world. Likewise, individual businesses face their own complex issues on a near daily basis – whether it is balancing stakeholder interest or harnessing internal innovation potential – they are all dictated by numerous variables that could unexpectedly derail an organisation at any moment. Technology has dramatically changed the world, yet many of our business processes haven’t kept up. As Albert Einstein famously said, “We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.”

From this perspective, leadership and sustainability are inseparable.  It is no longer possible to have a robust long-term strategy that doesn’t incorporate sustainability; and this isn’t something that can be achieved through an isolated committee. A true commitment to sustainability requires a paradigm shift in the traditional understanding of business success, as ‘best practice’ strategies increasingly fail to deliver in the new world. There are no ‘quick fix’ solutions and no individual can be the hero. 

The only approach to managing the complexity facing organisations today is for leaders to take a collaborative approach and start harnessing the collective wisdom that exists within their organisation.  This is the way to ensure true resilience in any organisation and drive long term sustained success beyond the short tenure of a management team or individual.

As more businesses awaken to this necessity, demand is emerging for a new calibre of workforce – with the unique capacity to think holistically and build organisational resilience in a community where environment and enterprise are inextricably connected.

The UK is already acting upon this trend, with 70% of companies predicting that one of their biggest future challenges will be the lack of sustainable leadership skills.

Despite escaping the predicted apocalypse of December 21st, we cannot deny that we are facing a new world.  And perhaps only those taking the ‘S’ word seriously will be strong enough to survive.