This essay takes the normative perspective that we, including humans, institutions and enterprises, other living beings, and ecological systems, are all stakeholders of a core focal entity—the Earth conceived as the living system Gaia. The argument is that for the purposes of considering the long-term health and well-being of humanity, Gaia rightly should be conceived as the ultimate focal entity with a huge variety of other living beings, systems, and future generations, whose well-being is also at stake in the relationship. This perspective highlights the ways in which Gaia affects and is affected by her various stakeholders. It incorporates a rationale for such thinking that relies on recognizing the normative elements of stakeholder theory, particularly those that derive from interactions of stakeholders and planetary elements. It presents a framework of mutual influence and interdependence, with implications for the ways in which humanity needs to act with respect to Gaia.
Asian Development Bank. (2006). Indonesia: Tsunami summary. Manila, Philippines: Author.
2.
Berry, G.R. ( 2003). Organizing against multinational corporate power in cancer alley: The activist community as primary stakeholder. Organization & Environment, 16, 3-33.
3.
Brown, L.R. ( 2009). Plan B 4.0: Mobilizing to save civilization. New York, NY: W. W. Norton.
4.
Brown Weiss, E. ( 1990). Our rights and obligations to future generations for the environment. American Journal of International Law, 84, 198-207.
5.
Brundtland Commission. (1987). Our common future: Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development . Retrieved from http://www.un.org/documents/ga/res/42/ares42-187.htm
6.
Buchholz, R.A. ( 2004). The natural environment: Does it count? Academy of Management Executive, 18, 130-133.
7.
Buttel, F.H. ( 2003). Environmental sociology and the explanation of environmental reform. Organization & Environment16, 306-344.
8.
Burton, M.L., & Hicks, M.J. ( 2005). Hurricane Katrina: Preliminary estimates of commercial and public sector damages. Huntington, WV: Center for Business and Economic Research, Marshall University. Retrieved from http://www.bama.ua.edu/~jcsenkbeil/gy4570/Katrina-economic%20damage.pdf
9.
Campbell, D. ( 2008). All about stakeholders: Part 1 (ACCA Technical Paper). Retrieved from http://www.accaglobal.com/pubs/students/publications/student_accountant/archive/sa_jan08_campbell.pdf
10.
Capra, F. ( 1983). The turning point: Science, society, and the rising culture . New York, NY: Bantam Books.
11.
Capra, F. ( 1995). The web of life. New York, NY: Anchor Doubleday.
12.
Carolan, M.S. ( 2007). The precautionary principle and traditional risk assessment . Organization & Environment20, 5-24.
13.
Carroll, A.B. ( 2004). Managing ethical with global stakeholders: A present and future challenge. Academy of Management Executive, 18, 114-120.
14.
Cavallo, E., Powell, A., & Becerra, O. ( 2010). Estimating the direct economic damages of the earthquake in Haiti. Economic Journal, 120, F298-F312. Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-0297.2010.02378.x/full
15.
Clarkson, M.B.E. ( 1995). A stakeholder framework for analyzing and evaluating corporate social performance. Academy of Management Review , 20, 92-117.
16.
Crane, A., Matten, D., & Moon, J. ( 2008). Ecological citizenship and the corporation: Politicizing the new corporate environmentalism. Organization & Environment , 21, 371-389.
17.
Daily, G.C., Ehrlich, A.H., & Ehrlich, P.R. ( 1994). Optimum human population size. Population and Environment, 15, 469-475.
18.
Davies, P. (Ed.). (1989). The new physics. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
19.
Decker, D.J., Krueger, C.C., Baer, R.A. Jr., Knuth, B.A., & Richmond, M.E. (1996). From clients to stakeholders: A philosophical shift for fish and wildlife management. Human Dimensions of Wildlife, 1, 70-82.
20.
Diamond, J. ( 2005). Collapse: How societies choose to succeed or fail. New York, NY: Penguin.
21.
Donaldson, T., & Dunfee, T.W. ( 1999). Ties that bind: A social contracts approach to business ethics. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.
22.
Driscoll, C., & Starik, M. ( 2004). The primordial stakeholder: Advancing the conceptual consideration of stakeholder status for the natural environment. Journal of Business Ethics, 49, 55-73.
23.
Donaldson, T., and Preston Lee E. (1995). The Stakeholder Theory of the Corporation: Concepts, Evidence, and Implications. Academy of Management Review, 1, 65-91.
24.
Dunlap, R.E., & Catton, W.R., Jr. (1979). Environmental sociology. American Review of Sociology, 5, 253-273.
25.
Elliott, J.R., Hite, A.B., & Devine, J.A. ( 2009). Unequal return: The uneven resettlements of New Orleans’ uptown neighborhoods. Organization & Environment, 22, 410-421.
26.
Englund, M. ( 2005). Katrina rips into the economy. Businessweek . Retrieved from http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/aug2005/nf20050830_8693_db035.htm
27.
Evan, W.M., & Freeman, R.E. ( 1988). A stakeholder theory of the modern corporation: Kantian capitalism. In T. Beauchamp & N. Bowie (Eds.), Ethical theory and business (pp. 75-93). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
28.
Fassin, Y. ( 2009). The stakeholder model refined. Journal of Business Ethics, 84, 113-135.
Freeman, R.E., & Gilbert, D.R., Jr. (1988). Corporate strategy and the search for ethics. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
31.
Freeman, R.E. ( 1994). The politics of stakeholder theory: Some future directions . Business Ethics Quarterly, 4, 409-421.
32.
Freeman, R.E., Harrison, J., & Wicks, A. ( 2007). Managing for stakeholders: Business in the 21st century . New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
33.
Freeman, R.E., Harrison, J., Wicks, A., Parmar, B., & de Colle, S. ( 2010). Stakeholder theory: The state of the art. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
34.
Freeman, R.E., Wicks, A.C., & Parmar, B. ( 2007). Stakeholder theory and "The corporate objective revisited ." Organization Science, 15, 365-360.
35.
Friedman, T.L. ( 2008). Hot, flat, and crowded: Why we need green revolution: And how it can renew America. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus & Gireaux.
36.
Frooman, J. ( 1999). Stakeholder influence strategies. Academy of Management Review, 24, 191-205.
37.
Fussell, E., & Elliott, J.R. ( 2009). Introduction: Social organization of demographic responses to disaster: Studying population: Environment interactions in the case of Hurricane Katrina. Organization & Environment22, 379-394.
38.
Gelbspan, R. ( 2005). Global warming and political power: The end of nature and beyond. Organization & Environment, 18, 182-185.
39.
Gladwell, M. ( 2000). The tipping point: How little things can make a big difference . Boston, MA: Little Brown.
40.
Gleick, James ( 1987). Chaos: Making a New Science. New York : Viking.
41.
Haigh, N., & Griffiths, A. ( 2009). The natural environment as a primary stakeholder: The case of climate change. Business Strategy and the Environment , 18, 347-359.
42.
Hawken, P., Lovins, A., & Lovins, L.H. ( 1999a). Natural capitalism: Creating the next industrial revolution . Boston, MA: Little Brown.
43.
Hawken, P., Lovins, A., & Lovins, L.H. ( 1999b). A roadmap for natural capitalism. Harvard Business Review, May-June, 145-158.
44.
Hill, Charles W. L., & Jones Thomas. M. (1992). Stakeholder-Agency Theory . Journal of Management Studies. 29, 131-54.
45.
Hoffman, A.J., & Sandelands, L.E. (2005).Getting right with nature: Anthropocentrism, ecocentrism, and theocentrism. Organization & Environment, 18, 141-162.
46.
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. ( 2007). Climate change 2007: Synthesis report: Summary for policymakers (Fourth Assessment Report). Retrieved from http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/syr/ar4_syr_spm.pdf
47.
Jermier, J.M. ( 2008). Exploring deep subjectivity in sociology and organizational studies: The contributions of William Catton and Riley Dunlap on paradigm change. Organization & Environment, 21, 460-470.
48.
Jones, T.M. ( 1995). Instrumental stakeholder theory: A synthesis of ethics and economics. Academy of Management Review, 20, 404-437.
49.
Jones, T.M., & Wicks, A.C. ( 1999). Convergent stakeholder theory. Academy of Management Review, 24, 206-221.
50.
Kaler, J. ( 2002). Morality and strategy in stakeholder identification. Journal of Business Ethics, 39, 91-99.
51.
Kasper, D.V.S. ( 2009). Ecological habitus: Toward a better understanding of socioecological relations. Organization & Environment , 22, 311-326.
52.
Kauffman, S. ( 1995). At home in the universe: The search for the laws of self-organization and complexity. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
53.
Kegan, R. ( 1982). The evolving self: Problem and process in human development . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
54.
Kegan, R. ( 1994). In over our heads: The mental demands of modern life . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
55.
Laplume, A., Sonpar, K., & Litz, R.A. ( 2008). Stakeholder theory: Reviewing a theory that moves us . Journal of Management, 34, 1152-1189.
56.
Latour, B. ( 2004). A prologue in form of a dialogue between a student and his (somewhat) Socratic professor. In C. Avgerou , C. Ciborra, & F.F. Land (Eds.), The social study of information and communication study (pp. 62-71). Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
57.
Lipton, B.H. ( 2005). The biology of belief: Unleashing the power of consciousness, matter, and miracles. New York, NY: Hay House.
58.
Lipton, B.H., & Bhaerman, S. ( 2009). Spontaneous evolution: Our positive future and how to get there. New York, NY: Hay House .
59.
Louv, R. ( 2005). Last child in the woods: Saving our children from nature deficit disorder. Conshohawken, PAAtlantic Books.
60.
Lovelock, J. ( 2000): Gaia: A new look at life on earth. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
61.
Lovelock, J. ( 2007). The revenge of Gaia: Earth’s climate crisis and the fate of humanity. New York, NY: Basic Books.
62.
Lovelock, J. ( 2010). The vanishing face of Gaia: A final warning. New York, NY: Basic Books.
63.
Mandelbrot, Benoit B. ( 1983). The Fractal Geometry of Nature, updated and augmented . San Francisco: W.H. Freeman and Company.
64.
McDonough, W., & Braungart, M. ( 2002): Cradle to cradle: Remaking the way we make things. North Point Press.
65.
McKibben, B. ( 2010). Earth: Making a life on a tough new planet. New York, NY: Times Books.
66.
McKinney, L.A., Kick, E.L., & Fulkerson, G.M. (2010). World system, anthropogenic, and ecological threats to bird and mammal species: A structural Equation analysis of biodiversity loss. Organization & Environment, 23, 3-31.
67.
Mitchell, R.K., Agle, B.R., & Wood, D.J. ( 1997). Toward a theory of stakeholder identification and salience: Defining the principle of who and what really counts. Academy of Management Review, 22, 853-886.
68.
Nicolis, G., & Prigogine, I. ( 1989). Exploring complexity: An introduction. New York, NY: W. H. Freeman.
69.
Norgaard, K.M. ( 2006). "We really don’t want to know:" Environmental justice and social organized denial of global warming in Norway. Organization & Environment, 19, 357-370.
70.
Norton, S.D. ( 2007). The natural environment as a salient stakeholder: Non-anthropocentrism, ecosystem stability, and the financial markets. Business Ethics: A European Review, 16, 387-402.
71.
Orts, E.W., & Strudler, A. ( 2002). The ethical and environmental limits of stakeholder theory . Business Ethics Quarterly, 12, 215-233.
72.
Phillips, R.A., & Reichart, J. ( 2000). The environment as a stakeholder? A fairness-based approach . Journal of Business Ethics, 23, 185-197.
73.
Pielke, R.A., Gratz, J., Landsea, C.W., Collins, D., Saunders, M.A., & Musulin, R. ( 2008). Normalized hurricane damage in the United States: 1900-2005 . Natural Hazards Review, 9, 29-42.
74.
Porter, T.B. ( 2006). Coevolution as a research framework for organizations and the natural environment. Organization & Environment , 19, 479-504.
75.
Prigogine, I., & Stengers, I. ( 1984). Order out of chaos: Man’s new dialogue with nature . Boulder, CO: New Science Library .
76.
Rowley, T.J. ( 1997). Moving beyond dyadic ties: A network theory of stakeholder influences. Academy of Management Review, 22, 887-910.
77.
Savage, Grant T., Nix, Timothy W., Whitehead, Charlson J., & Blair, John D. (1991). Strategies for Asessing and Managing Organizational Stakeholders. Academy of Management Executive, 5(2), 61-75.
78.
Sastry, N. ( 2009). Displaced New Orleans residents in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina: Results from a pilot survey. Organization & Environment , 22, 394-409.
79.
Senge, Peter ( 1990). The Fifth Discipline. New York: Free Press.
80.
Shellenberger, Michael, and Ted Nordhaus (2004). The Death of Environmentalism: Global Warming Politics in a Post-Environmental World, posted at: http://www.thebreakthrough.org/PDF/Death_of_Environmentalism.pdf , (accessed may 17, 2011).
81.
Shwom, R. ( 2009). Strengthening sociological perspectives on organization and the environment. Organization & Environment, 22, 271-292.
82.
Starik, M. ( 1995). Should trees have managerial standing? Toward stakeholder status for non-human nature. Journal of Business Ethics, 14, 207-217.
83.
Stubbs, W., & Cocklin, C. ( 2008). Conceptualizing a "sustainability business model." Organization & Environment, 21, 103-127.
84.
Sumaila, U.R., & Walters, C. ( 2005). Intergenerational discounting: A New intuitive approach . Ecological Economics, 51, 135-142.
85.
Waddell, S. ( 2011). Global action networks: Creating our future together . Hampshire, England: Palgrave Macmillan .
86.
Waddock, S., & McIntosh, M. ( 2011). SEE change: The transition to a sustainable enterprise economy. Sheffield, England: Greenleaf .
87.
Welcomer, S.A. ( 2010). Reinventing vs. restoring sustainability in the Maine woods: Narratives of progress and decline. Organization & Environment, 23, 55-75.
88.
Wheeler, D., & Silaanpää, M. (1998). Including the stakeholders: The business case. Long Range Planning, 31, 201-210.
89.
Wheatley, Margaret J. ( 1992). Leadership and the New Science: Learning about Organization from an Orderly New Universe. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.
90.
Wicks, Andrew C., Gilbert, Daniel R. Jr. , & Freeman R.E. (1994). A Feminist Reinterpretation of the Stakeholder Concept. Business Ethics Quarterly, 4, 475-497.
91.
Wilber, K. ( 1995). Sex, ecology, spirituality: The spirit of evolution. Boston, MA: Shambala.
92.
Wilber, K. ( 1996). A brief history of everything. Boston, MA: Shambala.
93.
Worthy, K. ( 2008). Modern institutions, phenomenal dissociations, and destructiveness toward humans and the environment. Organization & Environment , 21, 148-170.
94.
Windsor, D. ( 2002). Stakeholder responsibilities: Lessons for managers. In J. Andriof, S. Waddock, B. Husted, & S. S. Rahman (Eds.), Unfolding stakeholder thinking: Theory, responsibility and engagement (137-154). Sheffield, England: Greenleaf.
95.
Zsolnai, L. ( 2006). Extended stakeholder theory. Society and Business Review, 1, 37-44.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
