GreenBiz.com® |
ClimateBiz |
GreenerBuildings |
GreenerComputing |
GreenerDesign |
Greener World Media
-
DENVER, Colo. -- Green initiatives may be helping shipping and logistics companies achieve internal goals, but it isn't useful in attracting or retaining business, according to a recent survey. -
BARCELONA, -- Some of the world's most influential groups in environmentalism and tourism have joined forces to set standards for eco-friendly and socially responsible business operations in the industries catering to travelers. -
OAKLAND, Calif. -- The National Cleaners Association has developed a rating system for dry cleaners that looks at their entire operations.
Sponsored Links
How Bad Is Greenwashing, Really?
Digg
Del.icio.us
Reddit
Stumble Upon
Is greenwashing really as bad a problem as some are making it out to be?
I've been thinking about this question a lot recently, as the G-word crops up more and more frequently in articles, blogs, reports, and conversations. Of course, the answer depends a lot on one's view of the potential for big companies to improve their environmental performance — and talk truthfully about it — and whether the pace of corporate change is sufficient to address the magnitude of the problems we face. Like "beauty" (and "green"), "greenwash" is in the eye of the beholder.
The definition of greenwashing has changed in recent years. In the early 1990s, the term was used to describe deliberate and cynical attempts by companies to mislead the public about their environmental commitment and performance. In its seminal 1992 publication, The Greenpeace Book of Greenwash (download - PDF), the activist group described "the growth of citizen movements against environmental degradation in many countries," which, by the late 1980s, "had gained sufficient strength and exposure to become a potential threat to the political power and financial health of TNCs" — transnational corporations.
TNCs could no longer deny their role in environmental degradation. Instead, they embraced the environment as their cause and co-opted the terminology. While little changed in practice, the greenwash counterstrategy was born. Since the birth of greenwash, industry has devised a far-reaching program to convince people that TNCs are benefactors of the global environment.
Arguably, that's no longer the norm. Most companies are thinking seriously about their environmental impacts and risks, and what they should do about them. Most are doing something, though the majority are engaging in what I call "Random Acts of Greenness" — a few tweaks to their products, facilities, policies, or practices, but nothing that could be construed as systemic change. For the preponderance of companies, "going green" these days means a series of incremental changes that reduce, over time, their worst environmental impacts while, perhaps, garnering P.R. points.
Today, the 10th edition of the Concise Oxford English Dictionary defines greenwash as "disinformation disseminated by an organization so as to present an environmentally responsible public image." The U.S.-based watchdog group CorpWatch defines the term as "the phenomena of socially and environmentally destructive corporations attempting to preserve and expand their markets or power by posing as friends of the environment." In other words, deceitful behavior.
Such definitions pose more questions than answers. What, exactly, is a "socially and environmentally destructive corporation"? Is that nomenclature reserved for the worst of the worst, or do most big companies qualify? Should "disinformation" — the deliberate dissemination of false information — be ascribed to a less-than-perfect company talking about its genuine efforts to improve its performance? If so, how good does that company need to be to, in effect, have permission from activists and other watchdogs to talk its walk? Should only "good guys" be allowed to have that conversation?
The answers to such questions are of more than academic interest, or should be. These days, greenwashing is applied by some to just about any environmental statement from any large company. That's left many companies confused and conflicted, unwilling to talk about what they're doing right, however imperfect, for fear that such communications will brand them with the G-word. As a result, many companies I've talked to have clammed up, keeping their green initiatives largely to themselves, enjoying the other business benefits these efforts bring — reduced costs, decreased risks, improved quality, increased employee satisfaction, etc. — but foregoing the reputational benefits.
It's not just activists who aren't giving companies much slack. Case in point: In April I spoke to the annual conference of the Society of American Business Editors and Writers, a national association of business journalists. At a session on green business, reporters from some of the leading publications and news services — the Associated Press, Bloomberg, Dow Jones, Reuters, the New York Times, and dozens of others — posed questions for me and my fellow panelists. More often than not, the questions started out with some version of, "Given that 90 percent of what companies say is greenwash . . . ." If these gatekeepers of business information for the mainstream media don't give companies much green cred, why should activists, bloggers — or anyone else?
So, the question remains: Is greenwashing really all that bad?
Truth in advertising is vital for any marketplace, including the green one. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is re-examining its standards for truth in green advertising, along with the Canadian Standards Association, which recently released new green labeling guidelines. A U.K. study issued in May found that the number of complaints about ads that made green claims in 2007 was more than four times higher than the year before. Does that mean things are four times worse than before, or that four times more people are paying attention? The study doesn't say, though its authors acknowledge that "Most greenwash is due to ignorance and/or sloppiness rather than malicious intent."
Meanwhile, a small army of academics and activists are on the case, pointing out eco-hypocrisies both large and small — see examples here, here, here, and here. Clearly, the audience is listening.
Put it all together and it's not the travesty some would make it out to be. The rise of environmental marketing claims indicates that companies are engaged as never before — perhaps not sufficiently, but engaged. Companies are jumping on the green bandwagon in growing numbers, and they're starting to tell stories about themselves and their products. That's a good thing: storytelling is the first step toward transparency. Like all marketing, there's a tendency to resort to hyperbole and cliché. And that needs to be policed, no less so than safety claims by toy companies or nutritional claims by food companies.
As last year's Six Sins of Greenwashing report unveiled, there's a lot of sloppiness out there — a great deal of unsubstantiated claims as well as those that address only part of a product's environmental impacts, sometimes a relatively small part. But there was almost no outright deceitful behavior — fewer than 1% of all claims examined in the study were patently false.
So, is greenwashing — "disinformation disseminated by an organization so as to present an environmentally responsible public image" — on the rampage? I think not. Dubious marketing claims are problems that need addressing, but it's part of the growing pains of a new market. The rise of green marketing claims is a testament to how quickly being seen as green has become of importance to companies. Isn't that what all of us wanted to see happen?
Greenwashing represents the naturalizing of green as a meme. It demands scrutiny by all of us, and action against the egregious actors. But, in the end, as the saying goes, it's all good.
Post a Comment »Comments (4)
Sat, 07/19/2008 - 09:42 — Joel Makower
Loosen Up, Jeffrey
Jeffrey,
Thanks for your comment. I've long admired your outspokenness on the topic of the green marketplace, and your willingness to be, as you described yourself, an inspired protagonist.
I don't disagree with some of your points, but I think you missed mine. It wasn't about companies that can't handle criticism. And it wasn't about condoning companies that are being misleading or dishonest. As you well know, I have been an outspoken critic of greenwashing myself over the past twenty years.
But there is a tremendous amount of green activity going on in the world of business that doesn't fall into either category, and it deserves more than a little consideration and a knee-jerk response.
Nearly every big company these days is taking a hard look at its products, processes, and operations through the lens of environmental impacts, and many are making changes that reduce their impacts significantly, even though the changes may represent a small, even tiny, part of their operations. They are doing these things for a range of reasons — to cut costs, increase sales, attract and retain employees, reduce risks, and improve their reputations, among other reasons. Frankly, their motivations are unimportant, as far as I'm concerned. What's important is that they are engaged as never before.
The challenge most big companies face is how to make gradual changes without being pilloried for not being "good enough." Incrementally, after all, is how big companies change. Smaller, privately held firms like Seventh Generation can move much more quickly and boldly, especially when they have leaders as enlightened as you. But unfortunately, such companies are few and far between. The overwhelming majority of companies, especially big public ones, move much more slowly. Nonetheless, many are moving in a green direction, making changes both big and small. Yet I'm not aware of a single one that claims to be green.
Let's look at two of the examples you cite.
* General Motors has created a promising technology that it plans to introduce in 2010. It is widely anticipated by most environmentalists and transportation experts as a viable and attractive solution to reducing the use of oil. GM is currently scrambling to unload its gas guzzlers and is working on selling its Hummer division. The company executives I've talked to are simultaneously humbled and hopeful about their future and are changing direction. I can assure you that no one at GM, from their chairman down, has claimed that they are green, or even close.
* I checked the website of Procter & Gamble's Pure Essentials and didn't see any green claims. Yes, calling it "natural" is dubious at best, but it's hardly hardcore greenwash. Meanwhile, P&G has set a goal of selling $20 billion in sales of products with what it calls a "significantly reduced environmental footprint version of previous alternative products." (More on that here.) This may not fit your standard of "good enough," but it's hardly disingenuous.
Now, I'm not for a second claiming that either company is "green" — or even "good." Both have a long, long way to go, in my book. But both represent sea changes for companies with mega-billion-dollar worldwide impact. And my sense is that it is just the beginning, not the end, of their efforts in this regard.
(Full disclosure: GM is a client of GreenOrder, a sustainability strategy firm with which I am affiliated; I have no business relationship with P&G.)
It's not just GM and P&G, of course. There are dozens of other big companies trying to navigate similar paths — making changes while maintaining their market share and brand images, and doing it under the watchful eye of Wall Street, which has been anything but supportive of these efforts.
So, how should we view these companies? As polluting scam artists who should be scolded for deigning to talk about their efforts? Or as companies trying to shift directions, even if it's slower and more incremental than most of us would like? Do we beat them up or cheer them on?
I vote for the latter — always, of course, remaining watchful to make sure that their rhetoric doesn't get too far ahead of reality. In short, I think you — all of us — should loosen up a bit and give these companies some room to move — some rope on which to hang themselves, if you prefer. Transparency, as you point out, is key. I couldn't agree more.
Yes, there are more than a few companies that just don't get it — that are trying to put green lipstick on a pig by making environmental marketing claims that far outweigh the size of their efforts. (This includes many smaller companies, who all too frequently claim that we can "save the earth" by buying their organic socks, hemp soaps, or whatever. They're all good people making quality products, but their green marketing claims are sometimes outlandish, to say the least.) But for every company that doesn't get it, there are many more that are moving forward, however imperfectly. To dismiss every big company effort and statement as a "corporate disinformation campaign" needlessly tars both the leaders and the laggards with the same brush — and insults every earnest environmental professional in those companies who are trying — often against significant odds — to move the needle inside his or her company.
Like you, I'm concerned about the pace of change. I wish it were faster, and we need to keep the heat on companies to take bolder, more audacious actions. This is no time to celebrate small, symbolic measures.
But like it or not, we can't make the societal changes we need without the big guys. Seventh Generation is an admirable company, a true leader, but it alone can't address the significant environmental challenges we face. If the world's largest companies don't join in — well, your two decades of leadership will be all for naught.
Finally, since you brought it up — gratuitously, I might add — let me raise the Clorox issue, about which you've criticized me privately several times over the past few months. But since you've raised it publicly, I feel compelled to respond in kind. I did a small consulting project for Clorox for three months during 2007, acting as a sounding board for their outreach efforts in the run-up to the release of their Green Works cleaning line. My engagement, as I understood it, was to ensure that their messages were authentic and wouldn't overreach. I have done no work for them for nearly a year, and have disclosed my brief involvement with them whenever I've written about them.
If you'd like, I'd be happy to reveal to you offline the exact amount of money I received for these efforts, but to put it in perspective, it's a small fraction of the amount of money Seventh Generation paid me during the 1990s, when you were licensing a version of my green consumer newsletter.
Were all the laudatory things I wrote over the years about you and Seventh Generation (or were quoted as saying in the press) genuine, or just a symptom of my "clouded judgment"? You make the call.
Respectfully,
Joel
Mon, 07/21/2008 - 11:22 — Anonymous
The birth and growth of green
Thank you, Joel. I think an apt message for Jeffrey would be, "Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater." If we convince millions of people that most companies are greenwashing, those millions are going to leave some wonderful environmentally-friendly products on the shelf due to suspicions raised. No one wants to feel duped.
People change and do good things when they are inspired to do so. Chastising their initial efforts, even if paltry, is like criticizing a baby (before you throw it out with the bathwater) learning to walk when it takes a few steps and falls. If we scold and criticize, it's likely the baby will lose its motivation and confidence to get up and try to do it better.
Beyond that, if we're kind to the planet, but not to each other, how evolved are we really?
PJ Cannon
San Ramon, California
Tue, 08/05/2008 - 15:05 — Anonymous
Greenwashing
Thanks Joel for this informative article. Although I have been in IT for 20 years now I have only very recently entered into the world of Green IT by joining the Green IT committee here where I work (I work for a provincial government in Canada) I am currently sitting on the Hardware and Resource re-use and recycle sub-committee which is looking at ways to streamline the aquisition and disposal of electronic hardware that is no longer needed as well as how those resources are best used.
I understand what you are saying and I would like to add this experience. We have a recycling program here where a charitable organization will come in and pick up let's say 10 computers (an example number) from us that we have deemed as salvagable but not usable by government. However the charitable organization only wanted 5 computers. Since the recycle program was 'hard wired' the charitable organization HAD to take all 10 even if they only wanted 5. what was happening was that the charitable organnization would take all 10 and then throw out 5 of them into a standard garbage bin. What a waste!
The moral here is even if a company says they are green, the recycle process is very long and has many players from start to finish and what you consider as recycling or re-use may not always be as it seems. It certainly wasn't in the above case. The first mandate we delivered was to allow for charitable organizations to only take what they wanted or needed and leave the rest for further disposal by us. Then we enlisted a hard core recycling company that takes in electronics for their component parts, etc to handle the rest and now we are more confident that our recycling efforts actually lead to recycling.
Again, thanks
Charter Sponsor
Integrated Facilities Management Sponsor
Design Sponsor
Document Management Sponsor
Work Environment Sponsor
Innovation Sponsor
Environmental Services Sponsor
Technology Sponsor
Energy Management Sponsor
Public Relations Sponsor
Legal Sponsor
Greener World Media offsets its carbon footprint provided by Green Mountain Energy Company.
Greenwashing Is Bad. Really.
Joel Makower says greenwashing isn't so bad.
Is he right?
No, he’s wrong. Greenwashing is bad and it's getting worse.
Joel asks, “What, exactly, is a ‘socially and environmentally destructive corporation’? Is that nomenclature reserved for the worst of the worst, or do most big companies qualify?”
While Joel doesn’t actually answer his own question, I will. To varying degrees, all corporations are environmentally destructive, and most are probably socially destructive as well. On a net basis, virtually every company (Seventh Generation included) takes more from the earth than it returns, and as a result the planet is worse off. Nothing complicated about that.
Are all companies socially destructive? This, I’ll admit, is a much more complex question. But why ask it if you don’t have any thoughts on an answer?
But to the matter at hand: how bad is greenwashing? Joel argues that greenwashing scouts, “have left many companies confused and conflicted, unwilling to talk about what they're doing right, however imperfect, for fear that such communications will brand them with the G-word. As a result, many companies I've talked to have clammed up, keeping their green initiatives largely to themselves… .” Sorry, I don't have any sympathy for companies that can’t handle criticism. Is Joel beginning to sound like a corporate apologist?
Joel continues, “Put it all together and it's not the travesty some would make it out to be. The rise of environmental marketing claims indicates that companies are engaged as never before — perhaps not sufficiently, but engaged.” He continues, “So, is greenwashing — ‘disinformation disseminated by an organization so as to present an environmentally responsible public image’ — on the rampage? I think not.”
Oh really? Greenwashing might not be on a “rampage,” but it certainly is surging. To cite just a few examples:
*General Motors is advertising a plug-in hybrid, the Chevrolet Volt, which it doesn’t even sell. At a time when fuel-sucking SUVs have helped drive the US auto industry into a ditch, GM apparently hopes that its phantom Volt will give it a pristine green sheen.
*Procter & Gamble’s Tide Pure Essentials Detergents, with their earth-tone packaging and “naturally inspired scents,” turn Tide into a green wanna-be. Consumers believe they’re doing the right thing for their families and the environment by choosing Pure Essentials. But according to P&G’s Material Safety Data Sheets, Tide Pure Essentials products are identical to conventional Tide!
*Sunshine Makers’ Simple Green plays a similar game. Its key ingredients comprise the same toxic solvent that can be found in traditional all-purpose cleaners such as Formula 409 and Windex.
*Then there’s General Electric, Caterpillar, and Alcoa, which last year were widely hailed when they joined four environmental groups to endorse sweeping cuts in heat-trapping emissions. Problem was, behind the scenes, the three companies supported the efforts of an industry trade group to fight mandatory cuts in greenhouse gases, according to BusinessWeek. Sounds to me like the three giants are blatant emitters of that heat-trapping gas called hypocrisy.
Need other examples? Check out Greenpeace’s stopgreenwash.org, which billboards dozens of green pretenders. Greenwashing is worse than “bad,” because it runs the dangerous risk of breeding consumer cynicism toward companies that are genuinely trying to do good. That’s one of the reasons why Seventh Generation is partnering with Greenpeace for Change It ’08, which features a greenwashing curriculum and is educating the next generation of environmental activists.
Make no mistake: no company, including Seventh Generation, has attained the ultimate goal of fully embedding sustainability into all of its business activities. Given that every organization is to some degree imperfect, it is vital that companies are transparent about their environmental shortcomings as well as their successes. Only then can they begin to develop strategies for mitigating their negative impacts on society and the planet. But if a company is unwilling to acknowledge its failings—and certainly if it assumes a green guise that it hasn’t earned—it should be reproached. The stakes are too high to just let greenwashing slide.
I don’t know whether the glaring bright lights of these corporate disinformation campaigns have blinded Joel. And I don’t hold Joel’s consulting gig with Clorox against him. But could it be clouding his judgment?
Jeffrey Hollender
Chief Inspired Protagonist
Seventh Generation, Inc.