Ethical Analysis for Evaluating Sustainable Business Decisions: The Case of Environmental Impact Evaluation in the Inambari Hydropower Project

Sustainability

Julian Rode¹  Marc Le Menestrel³  Luk Van Wassenhove²  Anthony Simon⁴ 

[1] Department Environmental Politics, Helmholtz-Centre for Environmental Research—UFZ, Permoserstraße 15, Leipzig 04318, Germany;INSEAD, Social Innovation Center, Boulevard de Constance, Fontainebleau Cedex 77305, France; E-Mail:;Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Ramon Trias Fargas 25-27, Barcelona 08005, Spain; E-Mail:;Avenue du Golf 61, 1640 Rhode-St-Genese, Belgium; E-Mail:

关键词: sustainable development;    ethical analysis;    business decisions;    environmental impacts;    Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA);    hydropower;   

DOI  :  10.3390/su70810343

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

We propose an ethical analysis as a method to reflect on how companies’ decisions promote sustainable development. The method proceeds by first identifying the choice according to financial business interests, and by then scrutinizing this choice according to consequentialist and deontological ethics. The paper applies the method to the choice of an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) that a consortium of Brazilian companies (EGASUR) delivered as part of their project proposal for the realization of the Inambari hydropower dam in the Peruvian Amazon. We show that if an EIA is chosen based on the attempt to maximize the financial bottom line, it raises ethical issues both from a consequentialist perspective by involving negative consequences for various stakeholder groups, and from a deontological perspective by not complying with relevant rules, guidelines, and principles. The two ethical perspectives hence reveal where the consortium faces impediments to a genuine commitment to sustainability. Building on stakeholder interviews, observations of the project developments, and the executive summary of the actual EIA, we provide indications that EGASUR has indeed made a choice that resembles a decision based on financial interests.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2015 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.