Sustainability, Faith, and the Market

Abstract

While "sustainability" has become a major concern in business today, there has been little progress toward a sustainable future. This is because the idea of sustainability in academic and policy debates is too small and too beholden to the assumptions that have created today's environmental and development crises. Current calls for reform have neither the vision nor the authority to sustain us in the relationships to self, society, and environment that define our human being. Reaching beyond our secular profession of business management to our Christian faith, we argue for a bigger idea of sustainability that puts these relationships into their true context based on our relationship to God. We identify sustainability with four principles of Christian theology - which we label anthropic, relational, ethical, and divine love - and we link economic development with eight principles of Catholic social doctrine - which the Church labels unity andmeaning, common good, universal destination, subsidiarity, participation, solidarity, social values, and love. We believe this bigger idea of sustainability transforms talk about the future from a gloomy contentiousness rooted in fear to a bright cooperation rooted in hope.