The Green Debate: Information Optimists, Pessimists, and Realists

Green Grades ◽  
2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham Bullock
Keyword(s):  
Value Chain ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Environmental Politics ◽  
Information Value ◽  
Governance Strategies ◽  
Main Components ◽  
Civil Sector ◽  
Role Of Information

Chapter 1 outlines the debate about the role of information in environmental politics, and reviews the arguments both for and against the use of information-based environmental governance strategies. It describes the nature of these strategies and how they differ from other forms of governance and uses of information. It explores the use of information-based strategies by public, private, and civil sector actors historically, and discusses the factors that have driven their proliferation and the outbreaks of information in contemporary times. The chapter also presents the concept of the information value chain and its five main components (its governance, content, methods, interfaces, and outcomes), which provides an important analytical lens on these strategies and serves as the book’s primary theoretical framework. The chapter concludes with an outline of the book’s chapters and a summary of its key arguments and contributions.

Green Realism: Limits, Linkages, and Outcomes

Green Grades ◽  
2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham Bullock
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Governance Strategies ◽  
Role Of Information

Chapter 7 synthesizes the results from the previous chapters in a discussion of the idea of information realism and its cousin, green realism. It acknowledges the valid points that the optimist and pessimist sides of the debate have made about the role of information-based governance strategies, while also highlighting the shortcomings of these two opposing perspectives. It outlines three possible futures for information-based governance strategies – one that heeds the concerns of skeptics and lessons learned discussed in this book, one that ignores them, which will lead to their further loss of support and effectiveness, and a third that is based on the insights of information realism presented in the book. In particular, the chapter highlights the importance of creating linkages between information-based governance strategies and traditional regulation-based approaches and efforts to change industry norms more broadly. It returns to the green decision scenarios posed in Chapter 1, and offers specific recommendations for designers, users, and policymakers who are interested in improving the effectiveness of information-based environmental governance strategies.

Green Grades

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham Bullock
Keyword(s):  
Value Chain ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Corporate Sustainability ◽  
Information Value ◽  
Environmental Benefits ◽  
Forest Stewardship Council ◽  
Original Dataset ◽  
Forest Stewardship

A debate has emerged recently about the role of information in environmental politics. Much of this debate has focused on the emergence and effectiveness of product eco-labels and corporate sustainability ratings as a new form of environmental governance. “Information optimists” believe that the provision of information can be an effective strategy to protect the environment, while “information pessimists” are concerned that information-based approaches serve as a distraction from more effective forms of governance that rely on the rule of law. This book advances a third position of “information realism,” which acknowledges both the contributions and limitations of information -based governance initiatives. It asserts that these initiatives must develop into more mature governance initiatives for them to overcome their current weaknesses and produce long-lasting and substantial environmental benefits. The book uses a series of in-depth case studies and an original dataset on 245 cases of environmental certifications and ratings to discuss their contributions and limitations and highlight their best and worst practices. These include programs such as ENERGY STAR and USDA Organic, the Sustainable Forestry Initiative and the Forest Stewardship Council, and LEED and Green Globes. Each chapter is organized around a different component of the information value chain that is at the heart of these initiatives, and applies concepts such as legitimacy, validity, and usability to analyze how they are both constructed and perceived. The book concludes with a set of recommendations for policymakers, designers and users of these initiatives that can improve their long-term effectiveness as a form of environmental governance.

scholarly journals Future-Proofing Capitalism: The Paradox of the Circular Economy for Plastics

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Alice Mah
Keyword(s):  
Value Chain ◽  
Circular Economy ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Corporate Sustainability ◽  
Sustainable Business ◽  
Industrial Systems ◽  
Corporate Strategies ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
Sustainability Concept

The marine plastics crisis sparked a wave of corporate interest in the circular economy, a sustainable business model that aims to eliminate waste in industrial systems through recycling, reduction, reuse, and recovery. Drawing on debates about the role of corporations in global environmental governance, this article examines the rise of the circular economy as a dominant corporate sustainability concept, focusing on the flagship example of the circular economy for plastics. It argues that corporations across the plastics value chain have coordinated their efforts to contain the circular economy policy agenda, while extending their markets through developing risky circular economy technologies. These corporate strategies of containment and proliferation represent attempts to “future-proof” capitalism against existential threats to public legitimacy, masking the implications for environmental justice. The paradox of the circular economy is that it seems to offer radical challenges to linear “take-make-waste” models of industrial capitalism, backed by international legislation, but it does not actually give up on unsustainable growth. We need to tackle the plastics crisis at its root, dramatically reducing the global production of toxic and wasteful plastics.

Determinants and consequences of private environmental regimes

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Krisztina A. Pusok
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Environmental Politics ◽  
University Of Missouri ◽  
Political Consequences ◽  
Environmental Regimes ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
The University

[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT AUTHOR'S REQUEST.] While the role of firms has been acknowledged in existent research in political economy, it has played a rather peripheral role in the study of environmental politics, specifically in understanding environmental governance. In this dissertation, I seek to identify what the role of the private sector is in pushing the global environmental agenda. Specifically, I seek to offer alternative explanations for why firms choose to form these regimes, by drawing on existent comparative and international relations literatures focusing on political economy, governance, and the role of non-state actors. Additionally, I discuss the conditions determining firms to form private environmental regimes, as well as the economic and political consequences of this growing dynamic. Lastly, I investigate the mechanisms tying together different actors in terms of their environmental governance interactions.

Concepts and Theories of GIS in Business

2011 ◽  
pp. 1-19 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Keenan
Keyword(s):  
Information Technology ◽  
Decision Support ◽  
Value Chain ◽  
Emerging Technology ◽  
Business Systems ◽  
The Future ◽  
Role Of Information ◽  
Application Of Gis

This chapter looks at the concepts and theories underlying the application of GIS in business. It discusses the role of information technology in business generally and how GIS is related to other business systems. Different views of GIS use are introduced and the chapter suggests that decision support applications of GIS are more relevant to most businesses than purely operational applications. Porter’s value chain approach is used to assess the potential of GIS to contribute to management. GIS is seen as an emerging technology that will increase importance in business in the future.

Role of gatekeeping on Facebook in creating information benefits for vulnerable, pregnant women in the rural United States

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Devendra Dilip Potnis ◽  
Macy Halladay
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Pregnant Women ◽  
Value Chain ◽  
The United States ◽  
Information Value ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Qualitative Approaches ◽  
Types Of Information

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to investigate why and how gatekeepers on social networking sites (SNS) create what types of information benefits for gated, vulnerable, pregnant women in the rural United States.Design/methodology/approachThis qualitative study adopts “network gatekeeping” as a theoretical lens to implement a combination of deductive and inductive qualitative approaches for analyzing in-depth interviews with members and administrators of a Vaginal Birth After Cesarean (VBAC) Group on Facebook with a membership of over 500 pregnant women in rural Appalachia in the United States.FindingsThe VBAC group administrators' (a) vision of transforming the existing doctor-centric birth culture to a more mother-centric birth culture in the rural United States, (b) expertise and experience in healthcare and (c) valuing scientific, evidence-based information lead to recurring, authoritative but evolving manifestations of combinations of nine network gatekeeping mechanisms. Implementations of nine network gatekeeping mechanisms (i.e. localization, infrastructure, cost effect, channeling, censorship, regulation, editorial, user-interaction and value adding mechanisms) help VBAC group administrators control interactions and information on the group, thereby creating 16 information benefits for the gated, vulnerable women before, during and after pregnancy.Originality/valueThis sociological study of network gatekeeping posits and proves an “information value chain” (i.e. Why to create information benefits? – How to create information benefits? – What types of information benefits?) for vulnerable, pregnant women on Facebook. Rarely any study shows the role of network gatekeeping mechanisms in implementing an information value chain.

St. Luke’s University Health Network

2012 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Susan A. Sherer
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Health Care Delivery ◽  
Care Delivery ◽  
Strategic Objectives ◽  
Health Network ◽  
Governance Strategies ◽  
New Applications ◽  
Delivery Models ◽  
Role Of Information

The VP and CIO of St. Luke’s University Health Network wants to ensure that IT is a partner with the business in enabling new health care delivery models while controlling rapidly increasing costs. They face the challenge of maintaining existing resources while keeping up with rapid advances in information technology that provide opportunities to transform health care delivery. The VP/CIO wants to insure that new applications are in line with the strategic objectives of the health network. Instituting appropriate project management and governance strategies are critical to achieving this goal as is educating the business users on the role of information systems in health care today.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document