Ambiguity of Purpose and the Politics of Failure: Sustainability as Macromarketing’s Compelling Political Calling

Abstract

In this commentary we provide a brief review of sustainability research in the journal since its inception. Next, we offer an opinion on macromarketing’s ambiguity to sustainability as a political project and a resultant failure to provide substantial emphasis beyond the Development School for solutions in the field. Despite macromarketing’s centrality to marketing theory, the work in the journal has not had the impact it deserves in wider sustainability discourses. As two macromarketers with a lifelong interest in sustainability, we argue for more political reflection within the journal. We contend these current times of crisis require us to better listen to and act on prior counsel from critical and political perspectives within the journal, and submit, á la George Fisk, the journal’s first editor, that the politics of the day demand a persistence to continue to ask difficult questions. From a sustainability perspective this would be to consider how best to engender future macromarketing research in the field as a political project.