Sustainable Development Corporate Corporate Social

(bio-economic view) Sustainability Responsibility

Background Natural sciences, political Business Ethics, political science, and

disciplines science, and ethics management theory
Theoretical
Limits and carrying capacity.
foundation of the Moral and legal prescriptions
Moral prescriptions
normative approach
Table 1 – SD, CS and CSR. Background disciplines and theoretical foundation

Such an approach, for example, can be found in the interpretation of the word

“resource.” Resource scarcity, both in terms of source and sink, is the basis of the

concept of sustainability, setting normative boundaries to human economic growth

(Daly, 1992). But in the modern strategic management framework, “resources” was

assigned a totally different meaning, acquiring value only from the perspective of

competitive advantage (Wernerfelt, 1984, Prahalad and Hamel, 1990, Barney, 1991). In

other words, as Gladwin, Kennelly, and Krause very clearly pointed out in 1995, “Most

management theorizing and research continue to proceed as if organizations lack

biophysical foundations”.

The term “resource” may refer to several different concepts, according to the theoretical

“milieu” in which it appears (biology, ecology, economy, sociology). In considering the

SD framework, resources are the means available for the development of a nation - or a

population - and include natural resources (natural capital in terms of sources and sink),

economic resources (like capital goods and other forms of economic capital), and

human resources (like intellectual and social or relational capital). As noted above,

natural resources have specific properties that differentiate them from other forms of

capital and make them irreplaceable. Natural resources are often classified as renewable

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