Dispatches from Cuba Erb Faculty Director JOE ÁRVAI and Managing Director TERRY NELIDOV visited Cuba to explore ways in which the Erb Institute might help manage Cuba’s transition to a sustainable market economy. They met with two colleagues from Sol Economics and took a scholarly look at how the tension between many Cubans’ desire for sustainability and market evolution might unfold in real life. Árvai wrote about the experience in two blogs: http://myumi.ch/Lqqje and http://myumi.ch/6QqMO.
ANDY HOFFMAN AUTHORS CHAPTER IN STATE OF THE WORLD’S EARTHED With global environmental
on a Changing Planet includes chapters on
changes locked into our
traditional environmental education topics as
future, what we teach must
well as new topics essential for Earth education.
evolve. Environmental
In Erb Faculty Member ANDY HOFFMAN’s
education will need to
chapter on “The Evolving Focus of Business
both teach students to
Sustainability Education,” he opines that
be bold sustainability
business schools “must teach both enterprise
leaders and equip them
integration and market transformation simulta-
with the skills necessary to survive the turbulent
neously, even though these are fundamentally
century ahead. EarthEd: Rethinking Education
different approaches.” http://myumi.ch/JdrWV
THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN’S ERB INSTITUTE FOR GLOBAL SUSTAINABLE ENTERPRISE
ERB.UMICH.EDU
MICHAEL POSNER
Turning rhetoric into reality, in pursuit of the triple bottom line
ROUNDTABLE ON HUMAN RIGHTS ISSUES The field of sustainability has evolved in recent years to include
CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE ROLE OF CULTURE AND KNOWLEDGE
Erb Faculty Director JOE ÁRVAI published the
roundtable on “Managing Human
Erb Faculty Director JOE ÁRVAI’s
aspirational rhetoric about the need to adopt
Rights Issues in Global Companies:
article “Knowledge as a Driver
What Are Best Practices and How
of Public Perceptions About
Are They Implemented?” This
Climate Change Reassessed” in
article http://myumi.ch/J75M2
Nature Climate Change discusses
describes some of the participants’
research that suggests that how
perspectives and conclusions.
much people know about climate
human rights issues. Consumers and investors have made these issues a priority, so businesses are responding. As they do, collaboration is critical. The Erb Institute and
article “Expanding the Reach of Participatory Risk Management: Testing an Online Decision-Aiding Framework for Informing Internally Consistent Choices” in Risk Analysis. Many business cases, and business school classes, are overflowing with
World Environment Center held a
change is unrelated to how much
BENCHMARKS FOR CLEAN ENERGY TECHNOLOGIES Erb Executive in Residence TOM CATANIA chairs the Clean Energy Manufacturing Analysis Center (CEMAC) Advisory Committee. A recent report from CEMAC is the first of its kind to isolate and quantify the economic effects of clean energy manufacturing sectors. The report,
Benchmarks of Global Clean Energy Manufacturing, evaluates clean energy technologies and establishes benchmarks for their manufacturing supply chains. This Erb Institute paper http://myumi. ch/LBPDQ discusses the key findings and what they mean for the global economy.
they care about it, or how much support they’ll have for actions aimed at addressing it. This research argues that our feelings
sustainability as a guiding principle for enterprise. Research shows that decoupling economic progress from resource use and environmental decline can drive future success, and consumers are coming to expect businesses to provide products and services in a manner that addresses broad sustainability objectives. But knowing that the business transition toward sustainability is worthwhile and knowing how to make it happen are two different things. Decision scientist Joe Árvai and his team have been working with the private and public sectors to turn rhetoric into reality by developing and testing science-based decision-support systems that business can use to achieve the elusive triple bottom line. http://myumi.ch/LqqjN
about climate change are instead a function of “cultural variables,” which work independently from knowledge. New research by Árvai and colleagues from ETH Zürich suggests that this is not the case— and that much of the research comparing culture and knowledge misses the mark in terms of how knowledge and culture are measured. This research shows that education and decision support, aimed at the public and policy-makers, is not the lost cause that many followers of the culture wars think it is. http://myumi.ch/Lry5E
Many business cases, and business school classes, are overflowing with aspirational rhetoric about the need to adopt sustainability as a guiding principle for enterprise.
THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN’S ERB INSTITUTE FOR GLOBAL SUSTAINABLE ENTERPRISE
ERB.UMICH.EDU
THE RANA PLAZA COLLAPSE AND THE REPUTATION COMMONS PROBLEM In 2013, an eight-story building housing five garment manufacturers collapsed in Dhaka, Bangladesh, killing 1,129 people and injuring 2,515 more. The building’s top floors had been constructed without permits and, to cut costs, it was built using too little rebar (reinforcing steel). Twenty-three global apparel brands were eventually linked to one of the five garment factories in the Rana Plaza building, but this catastrophe created sustained attention from the public and the media to a wider set of problems associated with labor conditions in the garment industry. This piece is part of a series by Susan Kayser, a former Erb postdoc researcher. http://myumi.ch/LBPD7
The importance of framing in presenting numbers Research from the Erb Institute has found that the careful selection of numerical frames in communications responsible behaviors can make
HOW SOLAR WATER PUMPS COULD REVOLUTIONIZE INDIAN AGRICULTURE
these communications more
In America, the agricultural sector is responsible for barely 1 percent of total energy
regarding prosocial or socially
Former Erb Postdoctoral Researcher TATIANA SOKOLOVA
persuasive. When people hear statistics, it’s not just the numbers themselves that
have an effect—it’s also how the numbers are presented. The way numbers are framed affects how people evaluate that information and how they respond to it. http:// myumi.ch/JlpZm
Leapfrogging the Grid:
consumption. But in India, a whopping 18 percent of the nation’s electricity goes to power agricultural water pumps. The standard form of irrigation is flood irrigation, a common but inefficient system that involves pumping large amounts of water onto fields. The amount of water needed, and the energy required to move it, are particularly large in India, where the top crops are water-intensive rice and sugarcane. A new solution—solar-powered water pumps—can provide a more cost-effective, efficient and environmentally friendly alternative to current practices. http://myumi.ch/J754m
THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN’S ERB INSTITUTE FOR GLOBAL SUSTAINABLE ENTERPRISE
ERB.UMICH.EDU
Art that tells the story of our changing climate The artist ALISA SINGER created a series of more than 45 paintings called “The Art of Climate Change,” which delivers facts about climate change through art. For example, climate scientists have warned us not to exceed 2 degrees Celsius and 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, so she created one sketch that uses the two numbers as its design. Each painting is derived from a different fact about climate science. http://myumi.ch/6w5pk
WHY COMPANIES ARE BECOMING B CORPORATIONS The landscape of American corporations is changing, writes Erb Postdoctoral Researcher TODD SCHIFELING in
Harvard Business Review. Since the financialization of the economy in the late
A CONFERENCE ON SOCIAL MOVEMENTS AND PRIVATE ENVIRONMENTAL GOVERNANCE To solve environmental problems, governments
University of Venice, the University
and nongovernmental organizations have shifted
of Ottawa and Wharton to the Ross
away from traditional public law and toward
School of Business in May for a
private environmental governance—relying on
conference on Social Movements
voluntary programs, information disclosure,
and Private Environmental
ecolabeling and corporate campaigns. However,
Governance. This meeting laid
the relevant research on these phenomena is
foundations toward building an
scattered across disciplines, making it difficult for
international, interdisciplinary
researchers to stay abreast of new developments.
research community interested in social
Erb Faculty Member TOM LYON invited an
movements, private governance and information
international and multidisciplinary group of
disclosure. Participants shared results on topics
economists, sociologists, lawyers, political
such as ecolabel competition, greenwash and
Todd has recently accepted a tenure-track position
scientists and management professors, arriving
effective certification systems—as well as the
with Temple University. Best of luck, Todd!
from places including the University of Paris,
challenges they face.
1970s, corporate governance practices have tightly linked the purpose of business with maximizing shareholder value. However, as the 21st century pushes on, there has been an increased emphasis on other stakeholder values, particularly social and environmental concerns. This trend in corporate governance has fueled the emergence of a new organizational form: the Certified B Corporation. These corporations are social enterprises verified by B Lab, a nonprofit organization. http://myumi.ch/JdrWj
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Stephen M. Ross School of Business 701 Tappan Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1234
School for Environment and Sustainability 440 Church Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1041
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