The Ground We Stand On

Over the last year we have had the Stern Report, the Al Gore film ‘An Inconvenient Truth’, and literally hundreds, if not thousands, of news reports and coverage providing scientific evidence supporting the now self-evident fact that climate change is upon us.

And that’s just climate change – not to mention air pollution, water scarcity, an exploding global population, the list goes on.

Yet, sit with most groups of corporate senior managers and, for the most part, the conversation remains firmly rooted in ‘Business as usual’.

Corporate responsibility has yet to become fully integrated into the business strategy of most organisations. It remains a “bolt-on”, reflecting an important social trend but ultimately distracting to the principal business goal.

We are confronting a deep, culturally embedded taboo, and for the most part we either turn away or tinker at the edges. If we were to accept what future generations will know, viscerally, then we would understand that what is happening right now is far bigger than carbon emissions. It has to do with the basic assumptions upon which we interact and engage with the world, our lives, each other and all living beings.