Sustainability reporting (SR) has become a well-entrenched practice in the mining sector. Failure to adequately live up to societal expectations is now considered a significant threat to the viability of the industry. There is general agreement that broad endorsement of standards for nonfinancial disclosure supports mining companies to improve their image, while conflicts persist. Because sustainability reports “speak” on behalf of sustainably operating organizations and may create socio-political effects, we explore the symbolic nature of SR. We conceive of SR as a performative practice to research how it interferes with the world that it seeks to represent. Our case study research suggests that conformity with global templates is not an end in itself but might create below-compliance effects if a common interest in mining is developed in local arenas that avoids clarification of impacts and maintains ambiguity over responsibility.
Multinational mining companies operating in Latin America increasingly publish sustainability reports which outline their contributions to sustainable development. Companies argue that reports help communities better understand the importance of the benefits created by mining. However, we argue that sustainability reporting can only play a role in improving a company's performance and reputation if the quality of the reported data is good enough to answer community-raised contentious issues and if such are tackled through a stakeholder engagement process which includes 'anti-mining' groups. The paper examines a mining conflict in Argentina's Bajo de la Alumbrera open pit mine. The assessment is based on a content analysis of Alumbrera's Sustainability Report (SR), primarily from 2009, complemented with insights from the 2010 and 2011 reports. The study reveals that environmental and economic indicators are the most contentious and least reported. The reports examined only briefly acknowledge these issues, and fail to detail the procedures followed to identify and engage stakeholders.
There is much talk about the need for stakeholder participation and inter-sectoral coordination in forest policy and management. But there is limited understanding about forest agencies' role in the adoption of new governance modes and their contribution to policy delivery. By drawing on a qualitative implementation study of Bavaria's Mountain Forest Initiative in locally-operating forest agencies, the present paper addresses these gaps. The government wants them to establish collaborative arrangements with various stakeholders to facilitate measures for adaptation to climate change in private forests. The cross-case comparison provides detailed empirical insights into distinct sets of activities for making the initiative 'work'. Stakeholder participation gains a firm basis at the local level if forest agencies develop interest in and generate ownership of prospects for collaborative planning, and tailor these to their needs. The study suggests, however, that involvement of local stakeholders in forest planning is not necessarily instrumental for delivery of effective policies, as reliance on the local level entails the risk that the broader picture of initial policy goals gets lost.
The European Commission has built up an extensive system of expert committees over the last two decades, and reliance on these groups has become an indispensable part of EU public policy. Recent work on expert groups' distribution across policy fields, composition, institutional features and role in the policy process attests to their significance. The likely effects of expert group involvement, however, are largely unexplored. This paper examines how involvement of expert groups empowers the Commission vis-à -vis member states. It looks at the Commission's involvement of and learning from an expert group within the management of Europe's first programme on technologies for the Information Society. Programme management was regulated by a comitology committee, which helps to identify the conditions under which a sidelining of member states may occur.
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