Case Study: Exploratory Assessment of Sustainability Capability of Textile and Apparel Corporations in China

Sustainable development and corporate sustainability

Since the term "sustainable development" was first introduced during the early 1980s, it has evolved to be a systematic approach to achieve the integration of social and environmental responsibility in economic growth and development. Sustainable development is defined in the Brundtland Report released by the United Nations in 1987 as "development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs". The concept was later described as encompassing three domains of development: economic development, social justice, and environmental protection. Shaker argued "the term 'sustainability' should be viewed as humanity's target goal of human–ecosystem equilibrium (homeostasis), while 'sustainable development' refers to the holistic approach and temporal processes that lead us to the end point of sustainability".

Under the three-domain or three-sphere framework, Elkington proposed the Triple Bottom Line (TBL or 3BL) concept for mainly business communities. Noting that businesses cannot develop beyond the society and environment within which they operate, Elkington indicated that corporations should approach their performance evaluation from a broad perspective that includes both their financial performance, and their social and environmental performance. The TBL concept also implies a long-term perspective for companies to achieve longevity by emphasizing operations in ethical, social, environmental, and economic dimensions instead of a single dimension of finance.

Earlier, people focused on the social responsibility of corporations more than they did on environmental responsibility, so the term corporate social responsibility (CSR) was heavily used. More recently, the term corporate sustainability has been frequently used because the term sustainability incorporates both social and environmental dimensions of corporate responsibility. Throughout this paper, the term corporate sustainability is used to refer to business practices built upon social and environmental considerations.