Abstract
Sustainability basically means to continue, to maintain anything. The equivalent of sustainability on a firm basis is expressed as corporate sustainability. Corporate sustainability has three dimensions: economic, social, and environmental. This study aimed to use the systematic literature network analysis (SLNA) method to evaluate corporate sustainability on triple bottom line (TBL). In this context, SLNA on the development and evolution of the corporate sustainability issue was carried out with 1929 studies obtained from the Scopus database. VOSviewer software tool was used for constructing and visualizing bibliometric networks and Gephi software tool was used for network visualization. The studies on corporate sustainability, published in the period between 2016-2021, were mainly examined on the basis of year, journals, author details, keywords, and citation information parameters. This study is important as it is the first bibliometric study on corporate sustainability using SLNA.
TopIntroduction
The concept of sustainability basically emerged from the idea of people continuing their lives by preserving natural resources. People's future concerns about conserving natural resources go back centuries. Admittedly, our Paleolithic ancestors were concerned about the extinction of their prey, while early farmers were concerned about preserving soil productivity (Kuhlman and Farrington, 2010: 3437). With the industrial revolution, the global population has increased from 1 billion to over 6 billion, and people have begun to live longer, get better education and consume more. Increasing consumption, on the other hand, has led to many problems such as water pollution and scarcity, loss of biodiversity, land degradation, degradation of coasts and seas, exposure of living things to chemical and radioactive substances, sea level rise and climate change (Barnett et al., 2008: 355). The study titled “Silent Spring”, which was put forward by biologist and writer Rachel Louise Carson in 1962, focused on the environmental pollution caused by the current industrialization and focused the attention of the whole world on the systematic effects of environmental damage caused by chemical pesticides. The aforementioned book is considered to be the beginning of the environmental movement (Wood and Skates, 2006: 414). The concept of sustainability has gained importance as the activities carried out in the name of development cause environmental destruction. The concept of sustainability is expressed as sustainable development at the global level and corporate sustainability at the enterprise level. With the publication of the Brundtland report, the principle of sustainable development is generally accepted (Wiersum, 1995: 321). In the aforementioned report, the notion of sustainable development was comprehensively addressed and officially approved for the first time (Meadowcroft, 2000: 370). In the related report the sustainable development was defined as “meeting the needs and expectations of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs and expectations” (WCED, 1987: 51). The description of sustainable development made by WCED in 1987 is based on three principles such as environmental integrity, social justice and economic well-being. Sustainable development cannot be achieved if any of the principles, each of which is important in itself, is not taken into account (Bansal, 2005: 198). In other words, it is widely recognized that sustainable development is a holistic concept where environment, social equity, and economics intersect (Bansal, 2002: 123).
The equivalent of sustainable development on a firm basis is corporate sustainability. This concept is related to the extent to which companies contribute to sustainability. For example, an economically sustainable firm uses its resources effectively. An environmentally sustainable company carries out its activities without harming natural resources and biodiversity. A socially sustainable company, on the other hand, values social equality and invests in the training of its employees. In order to make a sound corporate sustainability assessment, it is necessary to consider the concept of triple bottom line (TBL) and consider three dimensions as economic, environmental and social.
In this study, it is aimed to use the Systematic Literature Network Analysis (SLNA) method to evaluate corporate sustainability in a TBL approach. In this direction, the course of trends and developments in the field of corporate sustainability has been tried to be revealed. In this context, SLNA on the development and evolution of the corporate sustainability issue was carried out with 1.929 studies obtained from the Scopus database. The studies on corporate sustainability, published in the period between 2016-2021, were mainly examined on the basis of year, language, type of document, countries/territory/organizations, journals, author details, keywords, and citation information parameters. This study is important as it is the first bibliometric study on corporate sustainability using SLNA. It is thought that the study will be a reference for researchers in the future and contribute to the literature.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Balanced Scorecard (BSC): BSC is a framework that enables us to implement and manage any strategy. It is a business performance management tool that balances financial measures with the organization's performance measures and goals.
Corporate Social Responsibility: This concept is the integration of a company's social and environmental impacts and its activities and interactions with its stakeholders. CSR can generally be thought of as a company's way of addressing the expectations of shareholders and stakeholders while expressing a balance between economic, environmental, and social imperatives.
Corporate Governance: It is a system of control that determines how a board of directors manages and oversees a company. In a business context, corporate governance is concerned with the rules, practices, and systems of processes by which companies are governed. In this way, the corporate governance model followed by a company expresses the distribution of rights and responsibilities to all participants in the organization.
Environmental Sustainability: Environmental sustainability is basically a concept related to the continuation of activities of a business without harming natural resources. An environmentally sustainable company preserves natural resources, biodiversity, and avoids any activity that would destabilize the ecosystem.
Sustainable Development: This concept, a paradigm of the United Nations, is concerned with the need for human societies to live and meet their needs in this direction without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.
Economic Sustainability: Economic sustainability is mainly concerned with the cost-benefit analysis of a business. This concept is related to the sustainable success of an economy.
Global Reporting Initiative (GRI): GRI is an international and non-profit organization that provides the framework for businesses and other organizations to share their economic, social, and environmental sustainability. It was found in 1997 in cooperation the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP).
Social Sustainability: Social sustainability focuses on the quality of life of individuals and the building of a sustainable, healthy, and equitable society that includes everyone, regardless of gender, gender, background, or disability. Socially sustainable communities enjoy equal and fair conditions.
Corporate Sustainability Reporting: Sustainability reporting, supported by GRI Standards, enables an organization to share its economic, environmental and/or social performance and its positive or negative contributions to the goal of sustainable development with the public and stakeholders.
Data Visualization: It is the application of translating data into a visual context, such as a graph, to make it easier for the human brain to understand and gain insight. It refers to techniques used to make data in graphs understandable by encoding them as visual objects (dots, lines, or bars). Data visualization is the graphical representation of information and data. Data visualization tools that use visual elements such as charts and maps; It allows to see trends and outliers in the data.