Business and the Natural Environment: A Research Overview

The fields of corporate environmentalism, green business and corporate sustainability have grown significantly over the past twenty-five years, such that the academic research domains of business decision-making, accounting, organizational behaviour, and the protection of the natural environment have developed into maturing areas of study within the management sciences.

Business and the Natural Environment: A Research Overview is a summary of the research thus far on this topic, offering a structure for understanding its emergence and growth, the multiple facets that make up its present state and a glimpse into the future of where it may be going. Along the way, the authors provide a compendium of its important works to help situate the interested reader in the landscape of the field. One important element of this work is its topical relevance; issues of environmental protection (and more recently sustainability) are critically important in today’s worlds of business, policy, and public understanding. Scholars who choose to enter this domain have much to offer of societal value while at the same time, entering a non-fully legitimate research stream that can lead to academic success (such as tenure).

This shortform book provides a research map for both new scholars who wish to enter the field and more seasoned researchers who wish to understand one view of the landscape and how they might fit within it. This expert survey of the existing literature brings the research story into the age of the Anthropocene and is essential primary reading.

Andrew J. Hoffman is the Holcim (US) Professor of Sustainable Enterprise at the University of Michigan; a position that holds joint appointments in the Management & Organizations department at the Stephen M. Ross School of Business and the Sustainable Systems group at the School of Natural Resources & Environment. He has published over 100 articles/book chapters, as well as 14 books, which have been translated into six languages. In this work, he focuses on the processes by which environmental issues both emerge and evolve as social, political and managerial issues. He receieved his joint PhD in Management and Civil & Environmental Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Susse Georg is Professor of Sustainable Innovation at the University of Aalborg, Copenhagen campus, in Denmark. Prior to her appointment at Aalborg University in 2012, she held a professorship at Copenhagen Business School and was co-director for CBS’ research platform on ‘Sustainable Business’. She has published articles, book chapters and two books on the development of corporate environmental management, clean technologies and sustainable cities. She is currently researching the organizational and institutional changes necessary for increased use of intermittent renewable energy in smart energy systems. She received her PhD in Environmental Economics and Policy from Copenhagen Business School.