Ecological Footprint and Planetary Boundaries

Ecological Footprint

• A measure of human demand on Earth's ecosystems.
• Quantifies the biologically productive land and water needed to produce resources and absorb waste.
• Assumes the entire planetary population adopts a specific lifestyle.
• Highlights the gap between resource consumption and the planet's regenerative capacity.

Key Concepts

• Supply and demand reflect Earth's regenerative capacity versus consumption.
• Personal footprint considers positive and negative actions towards sustainability.
• Positive actions include enhancing sustainability awareness, improving quality of life, and protecting ecosystems.
• Negative actions include unnecessary resource overuse, emissions, waste, and harm.

Planetary Boundaries

• Framework for nine critical processes regulating Earth's stability, identified by Johan Rockström.
• Thresholds if crossed, risk destabilizing planetary systems.
• Six boundaries crossed, including climate change, driven by greenhouse gas emissions causing global warming and extreme weather events.

Polycrisis

• Multiple crises (e.g., climate change, pandemics, geopolitical tensions) interacting to compound harm.
• Interconnectedness amplifies impact beyond individual crises.
• Hyperconnectivity and homogeneity (e.g., globalization) increase vulnerabilities, like supply chain disruptions and rapid pandemic spread.

Climate Change Risks and Opportunities

• Short-term risks include cost-of-living crises, geoeconomic tensions, cybersecurity threats, and social unrest.
• Long-term risks include climate change failure, biodiversity loss, resource scarcity, and migration.
• Opportunities include progress in climate action, shifts toward renewables, and improved resource resilience.

Systems

• Independent, yet interconnected components performing specific functions over time.
• Dynamic and adaptive, responding to internal and external changes.
• Examples include the human body, organizations, or a business supply chain.
• Importance lies in understanding interconnectivity, highlighting how one aspect can influence others.

Systems Thinking Strategies

• Look for patterns – understanding underlying causes, not symptoms.
• Use foresight (not forecasting) – considering relationships and potential scenarios.
• Zoom in/out – examining smaller components and the larger picture.
• Consider different perspectives – encompassing all stakeholders.
• Take small, incremental changes – evaluating and adapting before wider implementation.

Externalities

• Costs or benefits of an economic activity influencing third parties uninvolved in the transaction.
• Not reflected in goods/services' price, leading to system inefficiencies.
• Positive externalities: benefits accrue to others (e.g., planting trees).
• Negative externalities: costs imposed on others (e.g., pollution).

Regenerative Economy and Business

• Draws inspiration from natural systems, focusing on systemic health, resilience, and sustainability.
• 8 Principles of regenerative economy:
  1. Right Relationship: Understanding humanity's place in the ecosystem.
  2. Holistic Wealth: Recognizing multiple forms of wealth beyond monetary gains.
  3. Adaptive Innovation: Responding to changing conditions.
  4. Empowered Participation: Involving all system components.
  5. Environmental Stewardship & Regional Sensitivity: Tailoring solutions to specific sites.
  6. Networked Abundance: Encouraging interconnectedness and creativity.
  7. Robust Circulatory Flow: Efficient resource, money, and information systems.
  8. Balance: Balancing efficiency with resilience, and diversity with coherence.

Shared Value

• Business success integrated with societal progress, enhancing competitiveness and improving societal conditions.
• Differentiates from traditional CSR by embedding societal benefits within core business operations.
• Key Themes include redefining capitalism through aligning strategies with societal needs; moving beyond trade-offs; emphasizing value creation; and broadening profit-focus.
• Three ways to achieve Shared Value: reconceiving products and markets, redefining productivity in the value chain, and enabling local cluster development

Stakeholder Capitalism

• Emphasizes ethical and legal obligations to stakeholders, regardless of implications for financial outcomes.
• Includes not only shareholders, but also employers, customers, communities, and the environment.
• Contrast to shareholder-centric approaches focusing primarily on company profits.
• Types include instrumental- Stakeholder approach; classic stakeholderism focusing on moral responsibilities; beneficial stakeholderism prioritizing long-term societal & mutual value creation; structural- incorporating stakeholder interests into corporate governance.
• Significant to consider stakeholder interests in the long term

Alternative Enterprises/Organizations

• Examples: Cooperatives, Social Enterprises, Employee-owned businesses/Worker Cooperatives
• These models prioritize long-term sustainability and democratic participation in decision-making, usually integrating societal and environmental considerations into core purpose.
• Key differences include the shift from wealth maximization to the integration of broader societal well-being. Participation of diverse stakeholders; equitable ownership structures and long-term sustainability.