Corporate Sustainability - Face-Saving Window Dressing?

Over the past decade, corporate sustainability has become a must-have for every international company, an essential part of their global branding platform.

Despite the billions invested in it, few companies' environmental talk is matched by their walk, as business tweeter Ramon Arratia argues in The Corporate Sustainability Beauty Contest on CSRWire.

Arratia argues that company CEO's are deluding themselves about their sustainability credentials:

A 2010 Accenture survey of global CEOs found that 81 percent thought sustainability issues were ‘fully embedded’ into the strategy and operations of their company. They really think that having a CSR team reporting to public affairs with a nicely designed 150k report with some cherry-picked case studies and a set of qualitative targets plus a few quantitative targets on quick wins is ‘fully embedded’!

He suggests a three point approach--focusing on the footprint of products rather than the image of companies.

It is a challenge to high-profile PR programmes like last week's announcement of The Global 100: World Leaders in Clean Capitalism (by Corporate Knights), which lists two oil companies in its top 5 and is (unsurprisingly) heavily weighted toward Western, wealthy north European countries.

One of the ironies of  growing "environmental awareness" is that--in terms of perceptions--saving the planet has become just another capitalist scam.

Müntefering Resigns From German Government

Franz Müntefering, the socialist Employment minister and Vice Chancellor in Angela Merkel's coalition, has resigned to look after his wife who has cancer.

Müntefering has long been a bugbear of this blog's, mainly because of his posturing in Chancellor Schroeder's terrible government. Fulminating against the locusts of international capitalism (as was that government's wont), "Münte" blamed Jewish businessmen for Germany's economic woes. He might more usefully have looked at his own government's woeful 9 year record. Working with Chancellor Merkel has calmed him down as he has mediated between Merkel's centre-left CDU and his own socialist SPD parties. In comparison with the latter "Münte" almost resembles a man of reason, rather than the demagogue of limited brain he is.

Recently he was humiliated by his party's leader, a brutish, bearded mediocrity called Kurt Beck, in an arcane dispute about unemployment payments. Beck needed to improve his own profile within the party. He did so with a display of hard-left socialist rhetoric at Müntefering's expense. Now "Münte's" stepping down will give him a measure of revenge.

Müntefering's departure will destabilise the coalition. This could be good news for Angela Merkel, who leads in the polls, mainly because of her personal popularity. An election called soon would mean the end of this hopeless government, and a probable return to power for Merkel's CDU, supported by the centre-right FDP party.

For all the praise being heaped on "Münte" as he departs, this would be his only worthwhile legacy.