In September 2015, the world leaders gathered to endorse 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), demonstrating a paradigm shift for people and the planet build on shared values, principles, and priorities for a common destiny. In the process of consolidating the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) consultations with business representatives raised two issues related to the potential success of the goals. The first issue was to better measure and value true performance of business preconditioned by identifying the most significant impact areas. The second issue was concerned with integration of sustainability into core business strategies. Both issues lead back to the proclaimed paradigm shift built on shared values for a sustainable future as demonstrated by the SDGs and demonstrate challenges with implementation of the SDGs. Although comprehensive frameworks to help business integrate the goals have been developed, the complexity and sheer volume of the various targets and indicators hinder many companies from reporting on their performance and contributions. The textile and apparel industry, while endowed with enormous potential related to development of countries has drawn increased attention to its negative impacts along the value chain. The industry is also one of the first to integrate the SDG into their sustainability reports. However, critics point to the fact that simply linking sustainability activities to the SDGs is not enough and cherry-picking the goals that have the easiest business case will be insufficient. Thus, to address this potential discrepancy between communication and action, the aim of this study has been to investigate the perceived value of SDGs integration in sustainability reporting within the apparel industry. Through a critical discourse analysis, the study has reviewed six sustainability report by two Swedish apparel companies, Lindex and Filippa K, from 2015 to 2017. conceptual framework has been developed according to the SDG compass including two variables; communicated motives for SDG integration and methods to measure and report on goal fulfilment. The findings show that both companies are using the SDGs as a communicative tool to point to the conceptual motives which drives the sustainability work. Discursive strategies to frame the companies’ sustainability methods are made by utilizing the concept of “circularity”. The level of SDG integration differs between the companies. Lindex show discursive developments between 2015 to 2015 reflecting extended responsibility with correspondence between communication and action. While Filippa K does not show the same level of discursive maturity in terms of motive, the methods to address the sustainability issues related to circular fashion has accelerated significantly over the years comparatively to Lindex. The lack of communicated methods to address social issues is however evident. The findings further show that there is a correspondence between level of SDG integration and SDG contribution. This study corroborates with previous research arguing that the business world is more complex than something that can be assessed in a black and white dichotomy of hypocrisy versus sincerity and needs a much more sophisticated approach to the gap between promise and performance and that the SDGs have a transformative potential. It also provides insights on how the application of the SDGs can be seen through a spectrum between weak and strong sustainability depending on the maturity of a company’s sustainability management.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:uu-363378 |
| Date | January 2018 |
| Creators | Olofsson, Linnea |
| Publisher | Uppsala universitet, Institutionen för geovetenskaper |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
| Relation | Examensarbete vid Institutionen för geovetenskaper, 1650-6553 ; 2018/31 |
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