Walking which talk?: a discourse analysis of the New Zealand Business Council for Sustainable Development

Abstract

Over the last two decades 'sustainability' has become an increasingly popular term in environmental and business discourses. In Aotearoa New Zealand, the formation of the New Zealand Business Council for Sustainable Development (NZBCSD) heralded the arrival of greater corporate interest in this area. While many businesses have begun to adopt the language of sustainable development, however, there is often disagreement about what is actually 'sustainable'. In this research I do not define sustainable development. Instead, I (re)conceive it as a discourse bound between the tensions of maintaining further economic development and an intact 'natural' environment. In doing so I employ a poststructuralist perspective informed by Foucauldian thinking. Focusing on the NZBCSD, I examine what sustainable development means to the members of this Council, how this is implemented in practice and what implications this could have for wider society. My analysis is based on research of historical literature, a textual analysis of the NZBCSD website and interviews with the Business Council members. I argue that growing corporate involvement in this area is intimately connected with the social and economic reforms that occurred in Aotearoa New Zealand from the mid-1980s onwards. I also highlight how the NZBCSD's conceptions of sustainable development are embedded within wider business discourses of stakeholders and corporate social responsibility and a discourse of ecological modernisation. Through this analysis I argue that the Business Council is attempting to shape both the discussion on sustainable development and the wider understanding of environmental concerns. During this process other perspectives are being marginalised as 'unrealistic'. Nonetheless, while many of the members of the Business Council position themselves as 'drivers' for sustainability, they are also ambivalent about the worth of their own initiatives.