Profitable, Ethical, Sustainable: Investigating Corporate Responses to Climate Change

Abstract

Climate change is one of the most critical problems of our time. I use content analysis and network analysis to critically examine corporate responses to climate change as they are outlined on the websites of three of Canada’s largest corporations: Suncor Energy, Royal Bank of Canada and Bell Canada. I consider the data in light of two theoretical perspectives: ecological modernization and eco-socialism. The primary research question is: is private environmental governance effectively addressing climate change? To answer this question I first consider two more rudimentary research questions. (1) How are Canadian corporations responding to climate change? (2) What kinds of private environmental governance are Canadian corporations engaging with? None of the private environmental governance initiatives in this study appear to be directly leading corporations to reduce GHG emissions. The three corporations are responding to climate change in ways determined by corporate needs, rather than what is necessary to mitigate climate change.